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DISCOURSES 
i 

ON THE ^/^ 

LOVE OF GODf-^/^ 

AND ITS INFLUENCE 

ON ALL THE PASSIONS : 

WITH A. DISCOVERY 

OF THE RIGHT USE AND ABUSE OF THEM 

IN 

MATTERS OF RELIGION. 

ALSO, 

A DEVOUT MEDITATION ANNEXED TO 
EACH DISCOURSE. 



BY iT WATTS, D.D. 



NEWYORK: 

PRINTED AND PUBLISHED BY J. H. Tl/RNEY, 

133 East-Broadway, 

1832. 



.W3 



PREFACE 



In the first edition of these discourses, 

THE DOCTRINE OF* THE PASSIONS StOod aS 

an introduction to them, wherein their ge- 
neral nature was explained, their various 
kinds reduced to some regular order, the 
uses of them in human life represented, 
and moral and divine rules were proposed 
for the government of these natural and 
active powers. This little treatise has been 
much enlarged, and printed by itself, under 
a distinct title, namely, The doctrine of the 
passions explained and improved. These 
discourses of the love of God, and the use 
and abuse of the passions in religion now 
follow ; and since there are readers of a dif- 
ferent taste, who have desired each of 
them alone, they may now choose for them- 
selves, or they may order the bookseller to 
join them together if they please. 

Many years are now passed sincfe the ge- 
neral design of both these treatises was 
formed, and some brief sketches of them 
were drawn, which had lain by me in long 
silence among other papers. 



IV PREFACE. 

That which inclined me, at last, to draw 
up these discourses, of the use of the pas- 
sions in religion, into a more regular form, 
was the growing deadness and degeneracy 
of our age in vital religion, though it grew 
bright in rational and polite learning. 

There are too many persons who have 
imbibed, and who propagate this notion, 
that it is almost the only business of a 
preacher to teach the necessary doctrines 
and duties of our holy religion, by a mere 
explication of the word of God, without 
enforcing these things on the conscience, 
by a pathetic address to the heart ; and that 
the business of a christian, in his atten- 
dance on sermons, is to learn what these 
doctrines and duties are, without taking 
any pains to awaken the devout sensations 
of hope and fear, and love and joy, though 
the God of nature hath ordained them to 
be the most effectual allurements or spurs 
to duty in this present animal state. We 
are often told, that this warm and affection- 
ate religion belongs only to the weaker 
parts of mankind, and is not strong and 
manly enough for persons of sense and 
good reasoning. But where the religious 
use of the passions is renouneed and aban- 
doned, we do not find this cold and dry 
reasoning sufficient to raise virtue and 
piety to any great and honourable degi*ee, 



PREFACE. V 

even in their men of sense, without the as- 
sistance of pious affections. 

On the other hand, it must be acknow- 
ledged also, there have been many persons 
who have made their religion to consist too 
much in the working of their passions, with- 
out a due exercise of reason in the things of 
God. They have contented themselves 
with some devout raptures, without seek- 
ing after clear conceptions of divine things, 
or building their faith and hope, and prac- 
tice, upon a just and solid foundation of sa- 
cred knowledge. Whatsoever is vehement, 
if it hath but the name of God annexed to 
it, they are ready to think and call sacred 
and divine. This sort of religion lies very 
much exposed to all the wild temptations 
of fancy and enthusiasm: A great deal of 
the bigotry of the world, and the madness 
of persecution may be ascribed to this un- 
happy spring. I thought it necessary there- 
fore to speak of the abuse of the passions, as 
well as the use of them, and to guard 
against mistakes on both sides. 

As a foundation of these discourses, I 
chose to treat of the love of God, which in 
a sovereign manner rules and manages, 
awakens or suppresses all the other passions 
of the soul. The whole train of affections, 
both the painful and the pleasant ones, are 
under the power and regulation of love. 



^ VI PREFACE. 

In my pursuit of this subject, I have en- 
deavoured to avoid all extremes ; that is, 
neither to turn religion into a matter of 
speculation or cold reasoning, nor to give 
up the devout christian to all the wandering- 
fooleries of warm and ungoverned passion. 
I hope I have maintained the middle way, 
which, as it is most agreeable to the holy 
scripture, and to the genius of Christianity, 
so it has produced the noblest fruits of 
righteousness in every age. On this ac- 
count I may presume, that the track which 
I have pursued, will give no just offence to 
the wisest and the best of christians. 

In order to make this work more ser- 
viceable to the purposes of practical godli- 
ness, I have endeavoured to form a pathe- 
tic meditation upon the argument of each 
discourse, that I might as far as possible, 
exemplify the practice of those things 
which I recommend to the world, and assist 
the devout reader to make a present use of 
them toward his advancement in the chris- 
tian life. 



CONTENTS 



DISCOURSE I. 

The affectionate and supreme love of 
God 9 

discourse ii. 

Divine love is the commanding pas- 
sion. 31 

DISCOURSE III. 

The use of the passions in religion. 71 

DISCOURSE IV. 

Inferences from the usefulness of the 
passions. 106 

DISCOURSE V. 

Of the abuse of the passions in reli- 
gion 132 

DISCOURSE VI. 

The affectionate christian vindicated ; 
and the sincere soul comforted un- 
der his complaints of deadness, &c. 171 

DISCOURSE VII. 

Means of exciting the devout affec- 
tions 195 



DISCOURSES 

ON THE 

LOVE OF GOD, 

AND THE 
USE AND ABUSE OF THE PASSIONS. 



DISCOURSE I. 

The aflFectionate and supreme love of God, Mark xii. 30. 

^^ Thou shalt love thy Lord thy God with all 
thy heart, ^^ 

AMONG all the teachers of religion 
that have been sent from God to men, the 
two most eminent and illustrious are Moses 
iand Christ; Moses the servant of the liv- 
jing God, and Christ his only begotten Son. 
jBoth of them la}^ the foundation of all true 
' religion in the unity of God, and both of 
them make our religion to consist in love. 
Thus saith Moses in the sixth of Deutero- 
nomy, whence the text is cited, and thus 
j saith the blessed Jesus in the place where 
lit lies, Hear, O Israel, the Lord our God 
i is one Lord. Thou shalt love him with all 
litby heart. 



10 DISCOURSE I. 

It is no wonder that all the powers of our 
natures, with all the utmost extent of our 
capacities, must be devoted to the love and 
service of this God, since there is but one, 
since he is God^ilone, and there is none be- 
sides him, Isa. xliv. 6. He must reign over 
the heart and the soul, over all our intellec- 
tual and our bodily powers, supreme and 
without a rival. 

Though the love of our neighbour is re- 
quired both by Moses and Christ, as a ne- 
cessary part of our religion, yet it must ne- 
ver stand in competition with the love of 
our God, 

Some suppose the supreme and intense 
degree of this love, to be the whole design 
of Christ, in recommending the love of 
God to us in all these four expressions, 
" Thou shall love the Lord thy God with all 
thy heart, and with all thy soul, with all thy 
mind, and with all thy strength ;" namely, 
to intimate in general that all the faculties 
of nature should be employed in the love 
and service of God, with the greatest in- 
tenseness and full vigour of exercise. 

But if we should distinguish these sen- 
tences, according to the different powers of 
nature, into so many different significations, 
I think they may be most naturally thus ex- 
plained : God must bs loved with all the 
mind, that is, he must stand highest in the 



DISCOURSE I. 11 

esteem of the judgment : He must be lov- 
ed with all the soul, that is, with the 
strongest attachment of the will to him : He 
must be loved with all the heart, that is, 
with the warmest and sincerest affection : 
And he must be loved with all the strength, 
that is, this love must be manifested by the 
utmost exercise and activity of all the infe- 
rior powers. 

The heart in the language of scripture, 
and in the common sense of men, is the seat 
of the passions, that is, of fear, hope, love, 
hatred, joy, sorrow, shame, desire, and 
such like, which are usually called the pas- 
sions or affections of the heart. I shall not 
stand in this place to give a more exact or 
philosophical account of them, having done 
that in another treatise."^ 

If it be inquired, why the heart is said to 

[be the seat of the passions, there is this 

' good reason for it, namely, it is by sensible 

j effects on the heart, that several of tho^affec- 

I tions do chiefly exert and manifest them- 

I selves ; and it was chiefly for this reason 

that the Jewish philosophy gave the soul of 

man its chief residence in the heart, and 

unade it to be the seat of the passions. 

The heart also in scripture, and in al- 
most all nations and languages, is used to 

^The doctrine of the passions explained and improved. 



12 DISCOURSE I. 

express or imply sincerity; what is done 
from the heart is done sincerely ; perhaps, 
because the passions are naturally sincere, 
and are not so easy to be disguised as the 
outward actions of men. 

Now, since it is my design to treat of the 
exercises of the passions, or affections of 
the heart in the affairs of religion, I have 
chosen this sentence as the foundation of 
my discourses, the plain and obvious pro- 
position contained in the words is this, viz. 

" The Lord our God is the proper object 
of our most sincere affection, and our su- 
preme love." 

It is not enough for the eye to be lifted 
up to him, or the knee to bow before him ; 
it is not enough for the tongue to speak of 
him, or the hand to act for his interest in 
the world ; all this may be done by painted 
hypocrites, whose religion is all disguise 
and vanity : But the heart with all the in- 
ward power and passions must be devoted 
to him in the first place : This is religion 
indeed. The great God values not the ser- 
vice of men, if the heart be not in it : The 
Lord sees and judges the heart; he has no 
regard to outward forms of worship, if 
there be no inward adoration, if no devout 
affection be employed therein. It is there- 
fore a matter of infinite importance, to have 
th« whole heart engaged steadfastly for 



DISCOURSE I. 13 

God ; if this be done, we shall have a suffi- 
cient evidence in ourselves, that we are 
truly religious, and are beloved of God. 

In treating this subject, I shall consider 
these seven things : 

1 . What is presupposed and implied in 
the affectionate and supreme love of God. 

2. What will be the effects of this su- 
preme love to God on all the other passions, 
or how this divine passion will engage all 
the rest of the affectionate powers in the in- 
terests of religion. 

3. Of what use and importance the pas- 
sions are in religion, and what advantage is 
to be derived from them. 

4. How far the passions may be abused, 
even in religious concerns, or what is the 
irregular use of them, and how their efforts 
-should be limited arid restrained. 

Under each of these heads I shall pro- 
pose some useful reflections. 

5. We shall show how the affectionate 
christian may be vindicated against the 
cavils and reproaches of men, in his warm- 
est exercises of devotion. 

6. What relief or comfort may be given 
to humble and sincere christians, who com- 
plain that they feel but very low degrees of 
this affectionate love to God, or of the exer- 
cise of pious passions, either in public wor- 
ship, or in their devout retirements. 



14 DISCOURSE I. 

7. What are the most proper and effec- 
tual methods of exciting and engaging the 
affections in religion. Of each of these in 
their order. 

First, " What is presupposed and implied 
in the supreme and affectionate love of 
God ?" 

I answer, these five things :^ 

1. Some good degrees of the knowledge 
of God, and such an acquaintance with him, 
as may raise the highest esteem of him in 
our mind. It is impossible that we should 
love any thing that we know not ; audit is 
not to be expected that we should love God 
supremely, or with all our heart, if we have 
not kriown him to be more excellent, and 
more desirable than all other things we are 
acquainted with. We must have the highest 
opinion of his transcendent worth or we 
cannot love him above all things. 

It is granted, we may love or delight in 
some objects of an inferior nature as they 

* I might have described the affectionate love of God 
here by the love of esteem, the love of benevolence 
and the love of complacency, according to the distri- 
butions of love in the " Treatise of the Passions," men- 
tioned in the preface : but I chose rather in this place 
to show, what acts or operations of the understanding 
and will, are presupposed and included in the love of 
God : The more affectionate operations of it are reser- 
ved to the next discourse. 



DISCOURSE I. 15 

are instruments of our health, or ease, or 
comfort ; so we are said to love our habi- 
tation and our food, because they minister 
to our conveniency or support in the pre- 
sent life. We may love some poor worth- 
less wretches with good will and compas- 
sion, because we design to bestow some be- 
nefits upon them. We love our country and 
our kindred with a sort of natural attach- 
ment of the heart, because they belong to 
ourselves, and we are, as it were of a piece 
with them. We love our friends because 
we esteem them possessed of some valuable 
properties, and able to confer benefits on 
us, or to relieve our wants : But unless we 
see the great and blessed God, as a being 
possessed of the highest excellencies,, and 
capable of bestowing on us the richest be- 
nefits ; unless we see him as an all-sufficient 
good, we shall never love him with our 
whole heart : The afiection to so unseen 
and spiritual a being as God is, can never 
rise high where the esteem is but low : 
Where the love ought to be superior to all 
other loves, the esteem must be transcend- 
ent. 

2. The affectionate and supreme love of 
Sod, which presupposes a renewed mind, is 
usually accompanied by some hope of an in- 
terest in his favour, and the highest advan- 
tages from him. If I lie down in despair 



it 



DISCOURSE I. 



of his mercy, I cannot look on God, even in 
all his supreme excellencies, with an eye of 
love. The devil, the worst of creatures, 
knows more of the transcendent glory and 
worth of the great God, than the wisest and 
the best of mortals here on earth : But 
he knows there is no hope for him to obtain 
an interest in his favour, and therefore he 
continues in his old enmity. His rebellion 
has cut him off from all expectation of di- 
vine mercy, and therefore he cannot love 
this God of infinite excellency. "^A dread- 
ful state indeed for an intelligent being, that 
he cannot love what he knows to be infinite- 
ly amiable ! 

Hope is the most alluring spring of love. 
Terror and slavish fear stand opposite to 
this holy affection. Such " fear has tor- 
ment in it, and so far as we fear God as an 
enemy, we are not made perfect in his 
love," 1 John iv. 18. We love him, be- 
cause we hope that he has loved, or that he 
will love us ; It is the assurance, or at least 
the expectation of some interest in God, 
that engages the most affectionate love : 
And, perhaps, the words of my text may 
have some reference hereto, when it is 
said, <' Thou shalt love the Lord thy God." 
When we believe or hope that the Lord i^ 
our God, we cannot but love him. 

3. This love implies a strong inclina 
tion of the will towards God, a steady bent 



DISCOURSE I. 17 

of soul toward this blessed author of our be- 
ing and happiness : it implies a choice of 
him above and beyond all things else, 
as our most desirable portion and our eter- 
nal good. If any thing in^ this world be 
the chosen portion of our souls, if any thing 
beneath and besides God be made our chief 
hope, our support, and our life, our hearts 
will run out in strongest affections toward 
it, for it is our chief happiness ; and then we 
can never love God as it becomes a crea- 
ture to love his Creator. 

The holy Psalmist was a most affection- 
ate lover of his God, and how often does 
he call him the " portion of his inheritance,"*^ 
his refuge and his hope ?" Psalm Ixvi. 5, 
Psalm cxlii. 5; and in Psalm Ixxiii. 26, 
" Thou art the strength of my heart, and 
my portion for ever." Blessed saint! He 
hath chosen God for his eternal all. 

Under this head I should add also, that 

where the will is thus attached to God, the 

soul will exert itself in continual wishes for 

the honour of God in the world : It is the 

nature of love to wish well, and to do good 

to the beloved object; and since God can 

receive no other good from us, but the mani-' , 

festation of his excellencies and honours ' 

among men, we shall earnestly seek and 

,wish this glory of God, if we are sincere 

lovers of him. 

1# 



18 DISCOURSE I. 

4. This affectionate and supreme love 
of God, includes in it an out-going of the 
heart after him, with most intense longings, 
and most pleasing sensations : This is what 
we are wont to call more eminently the love 
of desire, and the love of delight which I 
shall speak of more at large in the follow- 
ing discourse. The heart of a sincere good 
man is restless till it find God, that is, till 
it obtain a solid hope and persuasion of his 
love, and a growing conformity to him, and 
constant delight in him. The heart is not 
easy without God; it acquiesces and rests 
in him alone. If I have God for my friend, 
and my everlasting portion, I have all : If 
he be absent, " O that I knew where I 
might find him !" Job xxiii. 5. And if he 
manifests his presence with his divine in- 
fluences, " Come back, O my soul, from 
amongst the creatures ; come back, and re- 
turn to God thy rest," Psal. cxvi. 7. 

5. Where the love of God reigns in the 
affections, it will command all the other 
powers of nature, and all the rest of the pas- 
sions to act suitably to this sovereign and 
ruling affection of love : The eye will often 
look up to God in the way of faith and 
humble dependence : The ear will be atten- 
tive to his holy word : the hand will be lifted 
up to heaven in daily requests : The knees 
will be bended in humble worship : All the 



DISCOURSE I. 19 

outward powers will be busy in doing the 
will of God, and promoting his glory : He 
that loves God will keep his command- 
ments, and fulfil every present duty with 
delight. He will endeavour to please God 
in all his actions, and watch against and 
"avoid whatsoever may offend him. And 
while the several outward powers are thus 
engaged, all the inward affections of nature 
will be employed in correspondent exer- 
cises. Supreme love will govern all the 
active train of human passions, and lead 
them captive to cheerful obedience. 

This brings me to the next thing I pro* 
posed : But before I enter upon it I would 
make these four reflections, which will con- 
clude the present discourse. 

{This discourse may be divided here,) 
Reflection i. How vain are all their 
pretences to love God, who know little or 
nothing of him, who are neither acquainted 
with the glorious perfections of his nature, 
nor with the wondrous discoveries of his 
grace ! Love must be founded in know- 
ledge. How vain are their pretences to 
love God with all their heart, and in a su- 
preme degree, who never saw him to be a 
being of transcendent worth, of surpassing 
excellency, and capable of making them for 
ever happy : who value their corn, and their 
wine, and their oil, their business, thei-^ 



20 DISCOURSE I. 

riches, or their diversions, more than God 
and his love ! 

Hovvr senseless and absurd is the pretence 
to love God above all things, if we do not 
resolve to live upon him as our hope and 
happiness ; if we do not choose him to be 
our God and our all, our chief and all-suffi- 
cient portion in this world, and that to come. 
Where the idea of God as a being of su- 
preme excellence doth not reign in the 
mind, where tte will is not deterrnined and 
fixed on God, as our supreme good, men 
are strangers to this sacred and divine affec- 
tion of love. Till this be done, we cannot 
be said to love God w^ith all the heart. 

Reflection 2. How necessary and 
useful a practice it is, for a christian to me- 
ditate often on the transcendent perfection 
and worth of the blessed God, to survey 
his attributes, and his grace in Christ Jesus, 
to keep up in the mind a constant idea of 
his supreme excellence, and frequently to 
repeat and confirm the choice of him, as our 
highest hope, our portion and our everlast- 
ing good ! This will keep the love of God, 
warm at the heart, and maintain the divine 
affection in its primitive life and vigour. 

But if our idea of the adorable and su- 
preme excellence of God grow faint and 
feeble, and sink lower in the mind : if we 
lose the sight of his amiable glories, the 



DISCOURSE I. 21 

i&ense of his amazing love in the gospel, his 

Irich promises and his alluring grace, if our 
will cleave not to him as our chief good, and 
live not on him daily as our spring of happi- 

[ness, we shall abate the fervenc 3^ of this?^ sa- 
cred passion, our love to God will grow 
cold by degrees, and suffer great and guilty 

jdecaj^s. 

' Reflection 3. How greatly and eter- 
nally are we indebted to Jesus the Son of. 
God, who has revealed the Father to us in 
all his most amiable characters and glories, 
and brought him, as it were, within the 

'reach of our love ! 

The three great springs of love to God 

[are these : A clear discovery of w^hat God 
is in himself : a lively sense of what he has 
done for us ; and a well grounded hope of 
what he will bestow upon us. All these are 
owing chiefly to our blessed Jesus. Let us 
consider them distinctly. f 

2. It is he, even the beloved Son of God, 
who lay in the bosom of the Father, who 
has made a fuller and brighter discovery to 
us what God^s, what an admirable and 
transcendent being, a spirit glorious in all 
perfections. It is true, the light of nature 
dictates some of these things to us, and the 
ancient prophets have given farther mani- 
festations. " But none knows the Father 
so as the Son does, and those to whom the 



22 DISCOURSE I. 

Son will reveal him," Mat. xi. 27. That 
blessed person who is one in essence with 
the Father, must know him best. He " in 
whom dwells all the fulness of the godhead 
bodily," Col. ii. 9, " whose name is Em- 
manuel, God with us," Mat. i. 23, " or 
God manifest in the flesh," 1 Tim. iii. 16, 
must know the Father with such an ex- 
quisite knowledge, as far transcends the 
reach of all our ideas. 

Let it be noted also, that the blessed Je- 
sus came down from heaven, not only to 
show God all glorious to men, but to make 
him appear all lovely and desirable in the 
eyes of sinners, by representing him in all 
the wonders of his compassion, and for- 
giving mercy. Even a great, a just, and a 
holy God, is lovely and amiable in the sight 
of guilty creatures, when he is willing to 
" reconcile the world to himself, in and by 
his Son Jesus Christ, not imputing to them 
their iniquities," 2 Cor. v. 19. Such a sight 
of God, is generally the first attractive of 
our love. 

2. It is the Son of God who came to in- 
form us what God has done for us, and 
thereby to engage our love. The reason of 
man and our daily experience teach us, that 
he is the author of our being and our tem- 
poral blessings : He " causes the sun to 
shine, and his rain to descend on the eavth,'* 



DISCOURSE I. 23 

Matt, V. 45 ; " he gives us fruitful seasons, 
and fills our hearts with food and glad- 
ness," Acts xiv. 17. But it is Jesus who 
hath told us the eternal counsels of his 
Father's love, and what kind designs he 
formed for our recovery from sin and hell, 
which in his own fore-knowledge, he beheld 
us fallen and miserable : He has told us, 
what eternal and unfailing provision God 
has made for us, by giving us into the hands 
of his Son, even into those hands, where he 
has intrusted the infinite concerns of his 
own honour ; and that he appointed his Son 
to redeem our lives by his own bloody 
death. 

This is glorious love indeed, and fit to al- 
lure and kindle our warmest affections to 
God. 

It is the blessed Son of God himself, who, 
by his Father's appointment, has suffered 
agonies and sorrows of unknown kinds, 
unknown degrees for us. He poured out 
his own soul to death tt) secure us from the 
deserved wrath and vengeance of God : to 
make a way for us to partake of his Father's 
mercy. 

3. Again, it is the same glorious person, 

the Son of God, who has informed us at 

large, not only what God has already done, 

! but what he will do for us ; and has given 

us the hope of everlasting blessings. He 



24 DISCOURSE I. 

has confirmed all the words of grace that 
God spake to men by angels and propliets 
in former ages ; and he has added many a 
rich and most express promise of a glorious 
resurrection, and a future state ; and set 
them before us in a divine light, beyond 
what the prophets or the angels ever knew 
in ancient times. He has assured returning 
sinners, of the pardon of their highest 
crimes, and the most aggravated iniquities, 
and he hath secured the everlasting favour 
and presence of God to all his followers: 
for by the Father's appointment he is gone 
to prepare mansions of glory for them, that 
where he is they may be also ; that they may 
dwell with him, and with his Father for I 
ever. 

Thus it appears that our everlasting 
thanks and praises are due to the blessed 
Jesus who has laid the foundation of an 
everlasting peace between an offended God 
and his guilty creature, man. He has re- 
vealed the great God to us, has told us what 
he is, and hath set him before us in his 
most amiable glories : He has taught us 
what wonders of mercy God hath wrought 
for us already, and what blessings he will 
bestow on us, through the future ages of li 
eternity : And thus he hath opened all ihe * 
springs of love to allure our hearts to God. 
What christian can withhold his love and 



DISCOURSE I. 25 

praise from so worthy, so diving a bene- 
factor ? 

Reflection 4. I may therefore well 
add, in the last place, that no person in 
heaven or earth was so proper to recom- 
mend us to the love of God, as Christ Je- 
sus our Saviour, who speaks the words of 
my text ; He who was himself the beloved 
Son of God, the highest object of his Fa- 
ther's love, and the best and most perfect 
lover of his Father : He who was the great 
peace-maker between God and sinners, the 
chief minister and messenger of his Fa- 
ther's love to men. If he had not under- 
taken to make peace, we had still continued 
childrenof wrath, and in the same state 
with fallen angels, who are never invited to 
return to the love of God. There is no pro- 
phet, no messenger sent to require or 
charge them to love God, for there is no 
priest or peace-maker appointed for them. 

Who is so fit a person to urge upon our 
consciences this blessed command of love 
to God, as he who came to redeem us from 
our state of rebellion and enmity, to deliver 
us from the anger of God, and the curse of 
the law, and everlasting death ? Who can 
give us such pathetic motives, and so pow- 
erful a charge to love the Lord our God with 
our whole heart, as he who came to write 
his Father's love to us in the lines of blood, 
2 



26 DISCOURSE I. 

even his«ovvn blood ? He whose heart was 
pierced for the sake of sinful men ; he who 
came to seal the covenant of love between 
God and man, with the anguish of his soul, 
and the blood of his heart ? How all-glo- 
rious and well-chosen is this messenger of 
the love and precepts of God ! This blessed 
prophet who is sent from God to recom- 
mend to us the eternal duty of divine love ; 
who is also our great high-priest to recon- 
cile us to God ! Yet how little success has 
the message had on the hearts of men. 
Whaf a sad and just occasion of shame and 
holy mourning! Forbid it, O Gbd, that 
such a messenger, and such a message 
should be sent from heaven in vain. 



MEDITATION. 

" What shall I do to become a true 
lover of God ? Since I know there is but 
one God, I would give up my whole heart 
to him alone : I would fain have him to 
reign in my affections supreme and without 
a rival. But let me recollect myself a little, 
and let me not deny what God and his grace 
have wrought in my soul. Do I not love 



DISCOURSE I. 27 

him sincerely, and above all things ? Am 
I not possessed of those qualifications which 
are contained and implied in the affetion- 
ate and supreme love of God? Let me 
run over them in meditation and self-in- 
quiry. 

" Have I not beheld him as the first, and 
the best of beings ? Have I not seen him 
most glorious in himself, and worthy of the 
highest esteem and love ? Am I not deeply 
convinced, and firmly persuaded that he is 
the only all-sufficient good ? That he is the 
overflowing spring of grace and blessed- 
jiess ? Have I not been taught to see the 
vanity and emptiness of all things beneath 
and besides God, and that without him I 
can never arrive at true happiness ? Has he 
not the most transcendent place in my es- 
teem ? Yes, O Lord, through thy grace I 
can say, the creatures are nothing in com- 
parison of thee ; nor can any thing appear 
in my eyes more lovely and more desirable 
than God and his love. 

" Again : Have I not been invited and 
raised by thy grace to some humble hope of 
thy favour ? Hast thou not revealed thyself, 
in thy word, as a God condescending to be 
reconciled to sinners, willing to be recon- 
ciled to me ? As a God willing to make 
creatures happy, even every creature that 
desires to centre itiself in God, and take up 



28 DISCOURSE I. 

its rest in him : O that sublime, that most 
excellent, that supreme Being, the holy and 
blessed God ! How merciful I How com- 
passionate ! Have I not seen him in his 
word descending within the reach of my 
hope ? And have I not rejoiced to think 
that he gives me leave to hope in him, as 
an eternal portion for my soul, and that he 
holds out the arm of his love to receive 
me ? 

" May I not proceed yet farther, O my 
God ? Has not my will been drawn power- 
fully toward thee, and make choice of thee 
as my everlasting good ? Have I not turned 
my back upon creatures at thy call, and di- 
vided myself from every thing, that I might 
be more nearly united to thee ? Have I not 
renounced them all, that I might be entire- 
ly the Lord's ? Does not my soul with firm 
purpose cleave to thee, as my immortal por- 
tion, and my'ever-during inheritance ? 

" Yet again, O my Lord, does not my 
heart sometimes go out after thee, with 
most pleasing sensations? O that I could 
say it never wandered ? But I humbly hope 
it will never, never be at rest while absent 
from God. Sometimes like the needle that 
is feebly touched with the sovereign in- 
fluence of the load-stone, it may be drawn 
aside by other influences, and it is too 
ready to wander from the beloved point: 



DISCOURSE I. 



29 



But may I not appeal to thee, O my God, 
that, like the needle, it is ever restless till 
it point to thee again, to thee, the object of 
my strongest desires, and my supreme 
love ? 

" Are not my flesh and spirit, with all 
their active powers, under the command of 
this divine principle, this holy fire of love ? 
Does not this heavenly alTection reign in my 
soul over all my faculties, all my senses, and 
all my passions ? Are not all my little affairs 
in this world, and all my more important 
concerns, regulated and governed by his ho- 
ly love ? Canst thou bear the thought, O 
my soul, of acting contrary to this inward 
vital and reigning principle ! Are not all my 
mortal interests subdued and devoted to 
divine love, and all my immortal interests 
united and summed up in it ? " Whom have 
I in heaven, O Lord, but thee ? and what 
is there on earth that I desire in compari- 
son of thee ?" Psalm Ixxiii. 25. 

" These eyes of mine, whither shall they 
look but toward thee? These feet, whither 
shall they go but on thy messages ? What 
shall these hands do, but the work which 
thou appointest them ? what is th^re that 
my tongue is employed in with so much de- 
light as in speaking of thee, and to thee, 
my Lord and my God ? All that I am, and 



30 



DISCOURSE 1, 



all that I have, is thine for ever and ever : 
Am I not then a sincere lover ? 

" Blessed be the name of Jesus the son of 
God, and my Saviour, that has descended 
from heaven to dwell with dust and ashes, 
that he might bring such worthless wretch- 
es as we are, within the attractive force of 
divine love. Our sins stood between God 
and man, like a wall of dreadful separation ; 
but by his glorious atonement he has re- 
moved the bar, and made the way of access 
to God free and open, that God and man 
might be united in the bond of perpetual 
love : he called sinners by his own voice, 
and he calls them still by the word of his 
gospel, to partake of this privilege. O 
blessed messenger of divine love \ And he 
sends down his Soirit from heaven, where 
he dwells, to make us willing to partake of 
this felicity, and to draw our hearts near to 
God. Come, O divine Spirit^ come, dwell 
in this heart of mine, as an unchanging 
principle of holy love. Guard my heart 
from all meaner allurements and in- 
fluences, while I am travelling through the 
dangerous region of this world, till I have 
arrived beyond the reach of danger, till I 
rest for ever in the bosom of God, my su- 
preme love, and my everlasting all." 



DISCOURSE II. 



Divine love is the commafiding passio7i. 

Having declared at large, in the former 
sermon, what is implied in the supreme 
love of God ; the second general head 
of discourse requires me to show, how 
this one passion of divine love will influ- 
ence all the other affections to the heart. 
The whole world are witnesses to this ef- 
fect of love in the common affairs of man- 
kind ; and this pov/erful passion still retains 
its own nature and sovereignty over the 
rest, when God is the object of it, which 
will appear in the following instances : 

I. If the soul be warmed with divine love, 
" the various discoveries that God makes 
of himself to us, will not only be matter of 
frequent contemplation, but of pleasing 
wonder." Admiration or wonder is a no- 
ble passion, arising from the view of some- 
thing that is new and strange, or upon the 
notice of some rare and uncommon object. 
Now when so glorious and transcendent a 
being as the great and blessed God becomes 
the object of our notice and our love, with 
what pleasure do we survey his glories, 



82 DISCOURSE 11. 

which are so rare, so uncommon, that there 
are none to compare with them ? We shall 
meditate on the surprising discoveries that 
he has made of himself, till we find new 
matter of holy admiration in all of them. 
Sincere and fervent love is ever finding 
some new beauties and wonders in the per- 
son so much beloved. 

The lover of God traces the footsteps of 
infinite wisdom and all-sufficient power, in 
the works of nature and providence. "When 
he beholds the heavens, the work of the 
fingers of-. God, and the moon and stars 
\yhich he has created," Psalm viii. 3. he 
first observes their immense vastness, their 
order and beaut}^-, and wonders at the skill 
and divine contrivance of him that made 
them : " O Lord, how great, how manifold 
are thy works ! In wisdom hast thou made 
them all." Psalm civ. 24. And then he 
wonders again at the condescending good- 
ness of God to his little creature man : 
"Lord, what is man, that thou art mindful 
of him, or the son of man that thou should- 
est visit him ?" Psalm viii. 4. The loving^ 
kindness of God has many admirable cir- 
cumstances in it, as well as his wisdom and 
power ; and therefore the royal Psalmist 
calls it marvellous. Psalm xxxi. 21 ; and 
spends many a psalm in the devout admi- 
ration of it. 



discourste II. 33 

Many of the providences of God are 
surprising : " He alone doth great won- 
ders," Psal. cxxxvi. 4. In the heavens and 
in the earth he doth " things unsearchable, 
marvellous things without number," Job 
V. 9. The soul that loves God will recall 
his ancient wonders with sweet delight, 
Psalm Ixxvii. 11; and w411 take notice of 
all his marvellous ways in his present con- 
duct of the world and the church. 

The glorious perfections of God and his 
works afford sufficient matter for the plea- 
surable and everlasting entertainment of 
this holy passion : he is an immense ocean 
of glories and wonders. There is nothing 
in God but what w^ould be marvellous and 
astonishing to us, if we had our eyes divine- 
ly enlightened, and our hearts fired with 
divine love. Every creature has something 
in it that surpasses our knowledge, and 
commands our admiration : but what are 
all these in comparison of God, the all- wise 
and almighty artificer, who made them all 
by his wisdom, and the breath of his mouth ? 
The soul that loves God is ready to see and 
take notice of God in every thing : he walks 
through the fields, he observes the wonders 
of divine workmanship in every different 
tree on his right hand and on his left, in 
the herbs and flowers that he treads with 
his feet, in the rich diversity of shapes, and 



34 DTSCdTTRSE II. 

colours and ornaments of nature : he be- 
holds and admires his God in them all. He 
sees the birds in their airy flight, or perch- 
ed upon the branches, and sending forth 
their various melody : he observes the gra- 
zing flocks, and large cattle in their dif- 
ferent forms and manners of life ; he looks 
down upon little insects, and takes notice 
of their vigorous and busy life and motions, 
their shining bodies, and their golden or 
painted wings; he beholds and he admires 
his God in them all : In the least things 
of nature, he can read the greatness of God, 
and it is what of God he finds in the crea- 
ture, that renders creatures more delight- 
ful to him. Creatures are but his step to 
help him to raise toward God. 

If it were possible for our admiration to 
run through and view all the marvellous 
things of nature and providence, there 
Avould remain still a vast field of wonders 
in his word, in his law, in his gospel, in his 
transactions of grace with the children of 
men. David, that intense lover of God, 
meditated on his statutes, his word, his 
testimonies ; he searched " wondrous things 
out of his law," Psal. cxix. 18 ; and ever 
found something in them worthy of his high 
esteem, and his holy joy. " O how I love 
thy lavy ! it is my meditation all the day. 
I have seen an end ofall perfection, but thy 



uisceuBSE II. 35 

icommandments are exceeding broad," Ps. 
cxix. 96, 97. But above all, the riches of 
mercy manifested in the gospel, awaken 
and raise the holy soul to a sublime degree 
of astonishment. " This is the Lord's do- 
ing indeed, and it is marvellous in our 

I eyes," Psalm, cxviii. 23. This was " the 
mystery that was hidden in God, and kept 
secret since the world began ; it was con- 
cealed from ages and generations, and now 
is made manifest, to the intent that now un- 
to principalities and powers of heaven, as 
well as men on earth, might be made known 

I by the church, the manifold, the amazing 

i wisdom of God," Rom. xvi. 25, Eph. iii. 

I 9. There is enough in his gospel to raise 
the wonder even of the sinners that refuse 
it : " hear ye despisers and wonder and per- 

I ish," Acts xiii. 41. Much more will it 
seize and employ the admiring powers of 
every holy soul, that has tasted of the love 
of God, and been partaker of this salvation. 
There is a divine and ten fold pleasure at- 
tends this exercise of sacred admiration, 
while the soul, in the language of faith and 
love can say '' Thou art the God who alone 
dost wonders, and thou art my God for 
ever and ever ?" 

I might add after all, there is yet still 
another world of wonders to employ the 
lover of God, and that is, the person of his 



36 DISCOURSE II. 

Son Jesus Christ our Saviour. There God 
discovers himself in his fullest grace and 
wisdom, in his highest power and perfec- 
tion. The attributes of the Father shine 
transcendently glorious in his Son, and be- 
come the object of love and Avonder to men 
and angels. He is " the brightness of the 
Father's glory, and the express image of 
his person," Heb. i. 3. All the marvellous 
things that God the Father ever wrought, 
was in and by his Son. Did he create 
all things out of nothing ? It was by Jesus 
Christ, Eph. iii. 9. Does he govern the 
world with amazing wisdom ? It is by mak- 
ing his Son Jesus, the Governor and Lord 
of all things. Does he redeem and save 
guilty sinners from everlasting miser^r? 
These wonders of mercy are transacted by 
the cradle and the cross of Jesus, by the 
death and the life of Christ, by the sorrows, 
the sufferings, and the victories of the Son 
of God. His name is called Wonderful, 
Isa. ix. 6. For he who is the child born, 
is also the mighty God : The infant of days 
is the everlasting Father, the first and the 
last, the beginning and the end of all 
things ! What sublime and sacred raptures 
of love and Avonder join together, when a 
devout christian contemplates his God in 
his nature, in his providences, in all his 
works, in the pages of his holy book, and 



DISCOURSE II. 



37 



in the face of his Son the blessed Jesus? 
But I have dwelt too long amidst these di- 
vine wonders, the following particulars 
must be more briefly handled. 

II. Divine love will command the affec- 
tion of holy desire. A sense of the favour 
of God, and the influences of his grace will 
be the matter of our most intense wishes 
and importunate requests. We shall long 
for the presence of God above all things, 
both here and hereafter. This was the fixed 
desire, this the passionate aspiration of the 
holy Psalmist, Psal. cxix. 5B: " I entreat- 
ed thy favour with my whole heart." What 
warm and pathetic language breaks from 
the lips of this great Saint, this sublime 
lover of God, in the 42d, 43d, and 84th 
Psalms ? " My soul longetli, yea fainteth 
for the courts of the Lord; my heart 
and my flesh cry out for the living God : 
as the hart panteth after the water-brooks, 
so panteth my soul after thee, O God. Ear- 
ly, O God will r seek thee, for thy loving- 
kindness is better than life." When he 
dwells in his own palace he longs for the 
divine presence, Psal. ci. 2. " I will walk 
within my house with a perfect heart. O 
when wilt thou come unto me ?" But his 
eminent desire is to dwell for ever in the 
sanctuary ; *' One thing have I desired of 
the Lord, that will I seek after, that I may 



38 DISCOURSE II. 

ever abide in his house, there to behold the 
beauty of the Lord, and to inquire and' 
converse with him in his holy temple," 
Psalm xxvii. 4. O happy soul, where all 
these active springs of passion are touched 
and influenced by divine grace ! Hunger 
and thirst, and all the longing powers and 
appetites of animal nature, are too few and 
too feeble to express the holy desires of a 
soul breathing after the presence of its 
God. 

III. When the love of God reigns in the 
heart, all the joys and pleasures of the man 
will unite and centre in God. It will be our 
sweetest satisfaction, and most exalted de- 
light, to have God ever near us, and to be 
ever near to God. As absence from God 
is a pain at the he^irt of a lively christian 
fired with divine love, so his glorious pre- 
sence is his chief joy. With what affec- 
tionate language does the holy soul of Da- 
vid rejoice in God, as his God ! and how 
does he employ the changing arts of poesy 
and music to express his own joys and the 
praises of his almighty friend ? One must 
run through a multitude of his psalms to 
copy out the bright expressions of holy de- 
light which he found in the love of God ; 
even the prospect and hope of waiting on 
him in his temple, fills his spirit with sacred 
pleasures, Psal, xlii. 4 : " I will go to the 



DISCOURSE II. 39 

altar of God, unto God my exceeding joy : 
yea, upon the harp will I praise thee, O 
God my God." Psalm Ixiii. 5, 6. " V/hen 
I remember thee on my bed, and meditate 
on thee, in the night watches, my soul shall 
be satisfied as with the marrow and fatness 
and my mouth shall praise thee with joyful 
lips." 

This joy, which is derived from the love 
of God, is supreme over all other joys, and 
independent of other comforts: when all 
the nether springs of delight among crea- 
tures are dried up, this is a fountain of 
eternal pleasure, a spring of ever-flowing 
delight, Hab. iii. 17, 19, "Though the 
fig-tree should not blossom, and there shall 
be no fruit in the vine ; though the field 
shall yield no meat, and the flock shall be 
cut off from the fold : yet the Lord God is 
my strength : I will rejoice in the Lord ; 
and joy in the God of my salvation. 

IV. Where tlie love of God prevails in 
the heart, every thing that belongs to God, 
his word, his institutions, his church and 
people, will in some proportion be the ob- 
jects of our choice and love, of our holy de- 
sire and delight. 

Has God condescended to give us his 
word, to write a book of knowledge and 
grace for the use of men ? How much de- 
light will the holy soul take in reading and 



40 DISCOURSE II. 

hearing the blessed words of this book ! A 
flame of heavenly love kindled in the heart, 
will engage us to converse often with those 
divine notices of himself, which God has 
sent us from heaven. Our delight will be 
placed in the law and gospel of our God, 
" and therein shall we meditate day and 
night, Psalm iv. 2. " Oh how I love thjjj 
law, says David, it is my meditation all the| 
day ; and in the night he remembers the 
name of Gk)d," Psalm, cxix. 55, 97. 

Has t be great God built a temple for him- 
self on earth, even the assemblies of the 
saints ? Has he appointed methods of wor- 
ship in which men shall address his majesty 
and whereby he will make them partakers 
of his love ? How desirous is the lively 
christian to attend on all these methods of 
divine appointment, to abide in the sanc- 
tuary, to frequent the house of prayer, and 
wait for the manifestations of the power and 
glory of God ? ^' I have loved the habitation 
of thy house, says David, and the place 
where thy honour dwelleth," Psalm xxvi. 
8. ''How amiable are thy tabernacles O,. 
Lord of hosts !" Psalm Ixxxiv. 1. 

Has God raised up children for himself, 
out of the sons and daughters of fallen 
Adam ? Then " every one that loves God, 
will love his offspring too," 1 John v. 1. 
This .is one of the chief evidences of a sin- t 



DISCOURSE II. 41 

cere love to God, when we love his people 
and those who bear his image, without the 
narrow view of a sect or party, or particular 
tribe of such a name. The saint loves all 
the saints, and the christian loves all chris- 
tians ; those who are most like to Grbd " are 
the excellent of the earth, in whom is all 
his delight," Psalm xvi. 2. And therefore 
he pities them under all their sorrows,, and 
he relieves their wants according to his 
power, because they stand in ^ near a re- 
lation to the God whom he loves, and bears 
his lovely image, 1 John iii. 16, 17. 

Has the great and glorious God one pe- 
culiar Son, his first-born, his only begotten, 
who bears his perfect image, and whom he 
loves above all the rest? This also is the 
chief object of a christian's love. Not fa- 
ther nor mother, son nor daughter, nor the 
-wife of the bosom, lie so near the heart of 
a christian, as the Son of God doth. He" 
not only bears the nearest resemblance to 
God, but he is one with God; "in him 
dwells all the fulness of the godhead bodi- 
ly :" Col. ii. 9. He is " Emmanuel, God 
with us," Mat. i. 21. " God manifested 
in the flesh," 1 Tim. iii. 16. There is more 
of the power and wisdom; there is more of 
the majesty and mercy of God, shines 
through the human nature of his Son Jesus, 
than in all the millions of men and angels 
2# 



42 DISCOURSE II. 

and all tlie worlds of unknown creatures 
that God ever made : And therefore the 
sanctified affections of the soul go forth in 
the strongest manner towards Jesus the Son 
of God : He is in their eyes the chiefest of 
ten thousand, altogether lovely. 

V. Where the passion of divine love 
reigns gloriously in the heart, every crea- 
ture separated from God will fall under a 
holy neglect and contempt. Nothing will 
serve or satisfy the good man, in the room 
and place of his God. All things, when laid 
in the balance, are lighter than vanity ; they 
are in his esteem, " like the small dust , 
of the earth before a mountain, or the drop J 
of a bucket, when compared with the | 
ocean," Isa. xl. 15. The language of such ^ 
a soul is, " Whom have I in heaven but 
thee ? and there is none upon earth that I 
desire besides thee. Psalm Ixxiii. 25. Crea- 
tures, with all their attractions and allure- 
ments, have no power to charm his heart ^ 
away from God : The divine lover is cru- 1 
cified to the world : it is like a dead thing | 
to him, tasteless, disrelishing, worthless 
and vain : There is a vast emptiness, and 
wide and universal desolation in the world, 
'if the soul sae not God in it. 

Business and diversions, cities and pa- 
laces, with their various ornaments, fields 
and groves, spring, summer, and autumn, 



DISCOURSE II. 43 

with all their flowery beauties, and their 
tasteful blessings, are some of the delights 
of the sons of men : Books and learning, 
and polite company, and refined science, 
are the more elegant joys of ingenious spi- 
rits : These things are the enticing gratifi- 
cations of the senses of the mind of man : 
they are all innocent in themselves, they 
may be sanctified to divine purposes, and 
afford double satisfaction, if God be amongst 
them : But if God be absent, if he hide his 
/ace, or frown upon the soul, not palaces, 
nor grove?, nor fields, nor busines^s, nor 
diversions, nor all the flowery or tasteful 
blessings of spring or summer, not the more 
refined joys of books and learning, and ele- 
gant company, not all the rich provisions of 
nature or art, can entertain or refresh, can 
satisfy or please the soul of a christian, who 
is smitten with the love of his God. 

I add farther, if the affectionate christian 
find not God even in his church and ordi- 
nances ; if his mind be not raised to hea- 
venly objects in the house of God, and in 
his sacred institutions, they are all empty 
and unsatisfying ; there is no life nor plea- 
sure in them ; a hypocrite is content with 
outward forms, and is well pleased with 
having paid his devoirs, and made his ap- 
peslrance in the church ; but the heart that 
loves God sincerely cannot be satisfied with 



44 DISCOURSE II* 

mere bodily devotion, nor with any pic- 
tures, shadows, or emblems of divine 
things, unless God who is the life, the spi- 
rit, and the substance, be there, and mani- 
fest himself in a way of mercy ; unless God 
fill his own institution with his own pre- 
sence, that is with the influences of his 
grace, with the enlightening, the sanctify- 
ing and the comforting operations of his own 
spirit. 

VI. The love, of God prevailing in the 
heart, will awaken zeal and activity, and 
holy delight, not only in the du.ties of wor- 
ship, but in all manner of services for God 
in the world. Can I do any thing for God 
whom I love ? saith the christian ; That shall 
be my joyful work. There is no labour or 
fatigue too much to sustain, no suffering too 
hard to endure, for the sake of God, who is 
so supremely beloved. What shall I do to 
honour the King of heaven, and to render 
him honourable in the earth ? How shall I 
spread his glory before the eyes of men, 
who in himself is so transcendently glori- 
ous ? and what shall I render to^the Lord 
my God, for the multitude of mercies which 
he has conferred upon me ? Psal. cxvi. 13. 
Divine love will make the law of God de- 
lightful in the practice of it, and none of his 
precepts will be a burden to the affection- 
ate and lively christian, 1 John v. 3. '' This 



DISCOURSE II. 45 

is the ]ove of God, that we keep his com- 
mandments ; and his commandments are 
not grievous." 

The soul that loves God will be always 
aspiring after greater degrees of holiness, 
because it renders the man more like God : 
It is commonly said of friendship or sincere 
love, that it either finds or makes persons 
like to each other. Love to God is an assi- 
milating principle, it works more and more, 
till we are transformed by degrees into his 
image : and if we are affectionate lovers of 
God, we shall never be perfectly pleased 
with ourselves, till we are delivered from 
the bondage of this sinful flesh, till we awake 
out of this dull and stupid state, into the 
world of spirits made perfect, and are there 
satisfied with the likeness of God. This 
heavenly delight shall be yet more exalted, 
when our bodies shall be raised in the like- 
ness of our glorified Redeemer, and our 
flesh and soul together shall be made to re- 
semble the holy Jesus in greater perfec- 
tion. With what a gust of sacred pleasure 
does the beloved disciple express himself, 
1 John iii. 1, 2. " We shall be like him, 
when we shall see him as he is ;" and when 
with. David we awake out of the dust of 
death, " we shall see the face of God in 
righteousness, and be satisfied with his 
complete likeness," Psalm xvii. 15. 



46, , DISCOURSE IT. 

VII. Every thing that offends or disho- 
nours the blessed God, will be a matter o^ 
hatred and aversion to the divine lover : 
and every thing whereby God had been of- 
fended in time past, will be the occasion of 
shame and grief. " I hate vain thoughts," 
saith holy David, " but thy law do I love," 
Psal. cxix. 113. Sin is the object of con- 
stant hatred in all its views, because it is 
contrary to the nature, the will, and the law 
of God, who is the supreme object of love : 
The good man is exceeding fearful of do- 
ing any thing that may offend or displease 
his God. When his soul looks back upon 
his own sins, he finds abundant matter for 
sorrow and holy shame, for self-resentment 
and pious indignation. O how hateful have 
all my sinful thoughts been ! My proud, 
my angry, and my revengeful thoughts ! 
That covetousness, that malice and envy, 
which have been working in my heart ! 
Those wandering imaginations which have 
called me away from the blessed God, even " 
from the midst of his worship ! How vile 
and guilty is my tongue, because of the 
foolish and passionate, and sinful words 
that I have spoken ! What a multitude of 
evil actions have been scattered up and 
down throughout my life, and intermixed 
with my behaviour towards God and man [ 



DISCOURSE II. 47 

A.11 these create bitter uneasiness and pain 
in the remembrance, because they are of- 
fences against a God who is supremely be- 
loved. What holy confusion, what melt- 
ings of heart in secret sorrow, do the true 
lovers of God feel, after they have indulged 
temptation, fallen under some more griev- 
ous sin, defiled their consciences, and dis- 
honoured their God? What pangs of in- 
ward remorse, and what sincere indignation 
against themselves ? And as an evidence 
of their love to God, they^ sometimes see 
reason to confess and bewail their folly, 
even in the sight of men. Holy David 
was not backward upon such occasions, 
to confess his grief for having offended 
his God : We may read the mournings 
of his love, in his penitential Psalms, 
particularly Psal. li. 3, 4 — 17 : and he of- 
fers a broken and a contrite heart in sa- 
crifice, to that God whom he had of- 
fended. 

A true and affectionate lover of God is 
pained at the heart, and feels a sensible in- 
ward sorrow to see how iniquity abounds in 
the land, to behold the laws of God broken 
by his fellow-creatures, and his holy nam.e 
blasphemed. " I beheld the transgressors, 
and I was grieved because they kept not thy 
Word : Rivers of tears run down my eyes, 



48 DISCOURSE II. 

because men break thy holy law,'^ Psalm 
cxix. 136, 158. 

VIII. Every thing that has a tendency 
to divide the soul from God, is matter of 
religious jealousy and holy fear. Divine 
love hath its jealousies : If we love God 
with intense affection we shall feel an in- 
ward anxiousness and solicitude, lest our 
hearts depart from the living God, and 
lest God should hide himself in his 
displeasure from our souls. This is 
what holy David is ever afraid of, and 
begs that God would not hide himself 
in anger. The apostle Jude, verse 21, 
bids us " keep ourselves in the love of 
Gpd :" The holy soul will watch against 
livery thing that may begin a separation, or 
break the divine friendship, and it grows 
jealous of every thing that comes too near 
the heart. 

When the true lover of God is deeply en- 
gaged in the businesses of the present world 
he manages them with a pious caution, lest 
his soul should be immersed and drowned 
overwhelming cares, or overladen with 
with increasing riches ; he is watchful, and 
afraid lest the dust and rubbish of this world 
should bury the holy seed in the heart, 
should obstruct the growth of religion, 
should carry off the thoughts from God to 



DISCOURSE II. 49 

idols of gold and silver, and thus defile the 
soul. 

If he has any share amongst the honours 
and equipages, the gay diversions and plea- 
sures of life, he is afraid lest they should 
fill his heart with vanity, lest they should 
tincture his spirit with sensuality and in- 
temperance, and thus take away the taste 
and relish of divine love. 

If providence call him sometimes into 
vain and wicked company, he is afraid of 
tarrying too many hours in the midst of 
them, lest ''evil communication should 
corrupt good manners," 1 Cor. xv. 33 ; and 
therefore " he will not stand among the 
counsels of the ungodly, nor walk i]i the 
way where sinners dwell," Psalm i. L He 
shuns them as a pestilence, because their 
ways are contrary to the pure and holy na- 
ture of that God whom he loves. 

Those studies, those employments, those 
recreations and amusements, which make 
the heart forget God, or withhold it too 
long from him, are uneasy and painful to a 
soul inflamed with divine love. 

As it is the language of the sinner who is 
weary of God, " When will the new moon 
be over, and the sabbath be done," that I 
may return to my trade and my labour, to 
my buying and selling, and the daily btisi- 
3 



i 



50 DISCOURSE II. 

ness, ofthis dying life ? So the sincere lover 
of God is ready to say, What, nothing but 
business and labour for the bread that pe- 
risheth ? Nothing but buying and selling, 
and seeking gold and silver, food and rai- 
ment ? Alas, how unhappily am I detained 
all the day from my God by these embar- 
rassments ! When will the evening come, 
and the season of pious retirement ? When 
will the sabbath appear, that I may spend 
my hours with God, and begin to taste what 
heaven is ? 

IX. Where the divine principle of the 
love of God reigns in the heart, all sinful 
passions toward God and men wdll be sub- 
dued by it. 

1. Toward God. One would think in- 
deed, that man should not dare to indulge 
any sinful passion towards his Maker ; but 
so corrupt are our hearts, that we dislike 
the holy nature of God, we are displeased 
with his will, and his holy commandments 
are grievous to us, till the love of God sub- 
due this inward aversion of the heart to ho- 
liness, and reconcile us to the law of God 
by the constraining influence of divine love. 

Again we are ready to repine at the hand 
of the Lord, to murmur against heaven, 
and to quarrel with our Maker, when we 
meet with disappointments in our affairs : 
We are inclined to grow peevish and fretful 



r 



DISCOURSE II. 51 



against providence, when we lose some de- 
sirable comfort or sustain some heavy sor- 
row, or long and tiresome sickness ; but 
holy love silences every murmur, and 
quashes every repining thought. Where 
the love of God prevails, afflictive scenes of 
life will never awaken resentment against 
heaven, but always meet with patient sub- 
mission. The sacred lover is not angry 
with his God when he smites him, for he 
ever supposes there is a just reason for 
every stroke of his Father's rod ; " Either, 
says he, my sins have deserved his correct- 
ing hand, or these sorrows are sent to exa- 
mine what grace there is in my heart, and 
to make trial of my faith : Still I am per- 
suaded there is love at the bottom of all 
these troubles, and it is the hand of love 
I that smites me ; for my Saviour hath said 
jit. Rev. iii. 19 ; *' As many as I love, I 
jrebuke and chasten;" and the holy apostle 
assures us, Heb. xii. 6, that " God corrects 
every son whom he receives." 

2. Divine love mortifies and subdues our 
disorderly and sinful passions toward our 
fellow-creatures; wrath, revenge, malice, 
envy, are all subdued and kept under by 
ihis sovereign principle of divine love. 
That soul in Avhom this sacred passion keeps 
3, constant flame, is not easily roused to a 
wrathful or resenting temper, by the aflfronts 



52 DISCOURSE n. 

and injuries we sustain from men. The 
lover of God is meek and gentle under ma- 
ny insults and reproaches : He can forbear 
and forgive, for he knows that his God hath 
borne long with him, and forgiven him ten 
thousand provocations. Thus the sove- 
reignty of divine love appears, in that it can 
STijppress as well as raise the other passions. 
X. Where divine love reigns in eminent 
degrees, there will be a humble holy desire 
to pass even through death itself to meet 
with God, the supreme object of love, and 
to dwell for ever in his presence. If faith 
be not too feeble, or the frailties of animal 
nature too prevalent, the divine lover will 
encounter death with courage, and with a 
sacred joy, because it will bring him to the 
enjoyment of his God. When the dust re- 
turns to earth, the soul of every man returns 
to God as a judge, and the soul of a good 
man to God as a friend, and father, and re- 
warder, Eccl. xii. 7. If " we are absent 
from the body, we shall be present with the 
Lord," 2 Cor. v. 8. In this view of things, 
the holy lover is ready to say, what is there 
in death so terrible, that the presence of 
Christ, and the enjoyment of my God, has 
not something infinitely more delightful to 
overbalance it? Love is stronger than 
death. 



DISCOTTRSE II. 53 

The love of God has been found stronger 
in a holy soul than all the pangs and terrors 
of death, even a death of violence and mar- 
tyrdom : The one influences and impels 
toward heaven more powerfully than the 
other can terrify or discourage : United 
faith and love have passed through fires of 
torment, and seas of blood, in order to see 
God and dwell with him in his heavenly ha- 
bitation. This leads to the next particular. 

In the last place, I add, that as hell will 
be matter of utmost aversion, and holy fear 
to a sincere lover of God, becajuse it is an 
everlasting separation from God, so heaven 
will be the object of desire and joyful hope, 
because there God manifests himself to all 
that love him, in his highest glory and his 
richest grace. 

The soul that loves God with warm af- 
fection, cannot bear those dreadful words, 
2 Thess. i. 9^ of " being punished with 
everlasting destruction from the presence 
of the Lord. To be without- God in the 
world," during the short space of our con- 
tinuance here, is a very formidable and 
grievous thing to the good man ; but to be 
cursed and condemned to depart from God 
for ever, this is the very hell of hell, if I 
may so express it, in the esteem of the soul 
that loves God : To be divided for ever 
from God, the spring of life and love, and 



54 DISCOURSE II* 

all happiness ; to be separated for ever from 
God, the infinite and the all-sufficient good ; 
to be thrust out for ever from the presence 
of God, the most lovely and the best of be- 
ings ; to see him no more, to love him no 
mor-e, and to be for ever banished from his 
love ; the very thought of it gives the holy 
soul more anguish than it is able to bear. 

On the other hand, heaven, which is the 
dweljiiagrplace of the Most High, is the 
mark which the good man ever aims at, that 
he may see God face to face. When his 
love rises high, he is ever breathing pas- 
sionately after this blessedness, and lives 
with delight upon the promises which give 
him this joyful hope. " Blessed are the 
pure in heart, for they shall see God," Mat. 
v. 8. " The good man's affections are set 
on the things above, where Christ is at the 
right hand of God," Col. iii. 1. 2. "-His 
treasure is on high, and his heart is there 
also," Mat. vi. 21. 

If we love God with all the heart, we 
shall keep heaven always in our eye. The 
foretaste of it will be our present comfort 
and support ; the thoughts of being for ever 
with God, will sweeten all the sorrows of 
life, and will take away the bitterness of 
affliction, and ease the pains of death. As 
Jacob cheerfully sustained a hard servitude 
of seven years in Chei^ldea, through heat 



DISCOURSE II. 55 

and cold, through frosts, and wind, and sun- 
beams, for the love of Rachel, so the chris- 
tian endures all the labours and conflicts, 
ail the fatigues and distresses of life in this 
lower world, with patience, and with holy- 
pleasure, in hopes to dwell for ever with 
God, whom his soul loves supremely above 
all creatures. 

Divine love commands and influences, 
excites or subdues the other passions of na- 
ture, and makes them all subservient to its 
own great designs, that is, to the honour 
and to the enjoyment of God, and the ob- 
ject of this divine affection. 

{Here this discourse may he divided.) 

Before I proceed to the third general 
head, I shall endeavour to improve this 
discourse by these three useful reflections. 

Reflection L " How happy and easy 
la rule is here given us to examine how 
stands our love to God, and whether we 
love him with all our heart." Are the other 
passions of nature influenced by this love ? 
Surely it is impossible for us in this present 
state of flesh and blood, to love God with 
our whole hearts, and yet to feel no sensible 
workings of fear or hope, desire or anger, 
in correspondence with this holy passion : 
To have no pleasure nor sorrows, no holy 



66 DISCOURSE II. 

longings, nor holy joys acting in concert 
with this principle of divine love. 

Believe me, Sirs, there are no outward 
actions, no visible attendances on public 
worship, no bodily services, no costly sacri- 
fices can so happily evidence our sincere 
love to God, as the steady and constant 
workings of the other inward powers of 
nature in a conformity to this holy principle. 
A hundred outward plausible actions may 
be the cloak of vice, the disguise of hypo- 
crisy. Vain Pharisees may make broad 
their phylacteries, may tithe their herds and 
their flocks, as well as mint and cummin, 
may give much alms, or build hospitals and 
churches ; but the various inward affections 
of nature can never be kejit in any regular 
and steady exercise of piety, by all the toil 
and skill of a hypocrite. And on the other 
hand, if the heart be thoroughly devoted to 
the love of God, this love will reign sove- 
reign among the other passions. The other 
passions will obey love, and we may judge 
by their obedience, how far the love of God 
prevails. 

Reflection II. " If mankind be exa- 
mined by this rule, how few sincere lovers 
of God will be found among them !" It is a 
vain thing for a man to say, " I love God 
with all my heart," when his strongest de- 
sires and his most relishing joys centre in 



i 



DISCOURSE II. 57 

meaner objects ; when his highest hopes and 
his most painful fears, his deepest anxieties 
and disquietudes of mind, are always raised, 
and sunk again by the things of this world 
only, and the changing scenes of this mor- 
tal state. 

- Alas ! How few are there ^vhose love to 
God does not fall under some just suspi- 
cion, when brought to this test! Let us 
survey the world round about us, and ob- 
serve what it is that influences the various 
passions of men-, even those who are called 
christians, and would be thought the disci- 
ples of Christ. 

Some have their hearts so filled with the 
business of this life, and the love of money, 
as their chief idol, that all their desires their 
fears, and their hopes, and the perpetual 
course and labour of all their powers, keep 
this point ever in view, and in warm pur- 
suit : The disappointment of a small sum, 
the loss of a few pounds will hang upon their 
spirits with a constant heaviness, and create 
them more pain than twenty sins against 
God their Maker. What shall we think of 
these people, who love riches so well, that 
if their hands and their heads would hold 
out, and day-light would last, they would 
never be weary of this chase, nor require 
cessation or respite. Does the love of God 
appear as the supreme ^nd reigning passion 



58 DISCOURSE II. 

in such earthly souls as these ? There have 
been some in all ages, and there are the 
successors of them in our day, who have 
loved gold and silver with so warm a pas- 
sion, even to the very end of life, that if 
they could but have contrived how to carry 
it away with them to the other world, there 
would have been but little silver, and scarce 
any gold left in our world long ere this time. 
This has employed their morning thoughts 
and evening affections, their earnest wishes, 
and their busy fingers day and night, so as 
to leave little room for the love of God and 
religion. 

Others there^re who make honour and 
esteem, or perhaps the grandeur and pomp, 
and equipage of life, the chief objects of 
their love. Their hopes and cares, their 
desires and inquiries are, how shall I shine 
among men, and make a figure in the 
world ? Every gay gilded thing they see 
raises their wishes : Ambition, honour and 
applause, engage their whole souls. A fan- 
cied contempt or neglect of them stirs their 
jealousy, and awakens all their uneasy pas- 
sions. They mourn more, and are more 
inwardly and deeply vexed for one re- 
proachful word from men, than for all their 
own affronts to the great and blessed God. 
Can the love of God reign in a heart so 
puffed up and filled with self and vanity ? 



DISCOURSE IT* 59 

There are others again, whose idol is 
pleasure and vain delight. A round of 
pleasing amusements, a succession of sen- 
sualities, is their chief good : This employs 
their constant contrivances, this engages 
their hopes and fears, and every passion. 
They spend their anxious inquiries upon 
the gratification of appetite, humour and 
fancy : " What shall I eat, and what shall I 
drink : How shall I dine elegantly, and re- 
gale myself at the table ? What are the most 
luxurious dishes in season, and where shall 
I find gay or merry company in the even- 
ing?" The tavern, or the meaner drinking- 
house, the comedy, or the ball, and every 
place of pastime, whether lawful or unlaw- 
ful, detain their souls as well as their bo- 
dies, and engage their thoughts long be- 
forehand. Does the sincere love of God 
reign in such sort of spirits ? 

These are the things that busy and en- 
gross the daily passions of men, and scarce 
a small corner of their hearts is left for 
God and religion. But let us remember 
God as an all-glorious and sovereign being, 
his holy jealousy forbids him to accept of a 
corner of the heart. He refuses and dis- 
dains every lover that does not give up his 
whole self to him with all his powers. 
" Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with 
all thy heart, and with all thy soul :" Every 



60 DISCOURSE II. 

affection must and will be employed in a 
pious manner, where divine love is, as it 
always ought to be, the supreme passion. 
But, alas ! how few souls are thus moulded 
and refined, how few are regulated and 
governed by a divine principle ! Man is 
the creature of God, and owes his all to 
him ; but the creature man does not love 
his Creator. 

Eeflection in. If divine love be so 
^Gkvereign and ruling an affection, then " the 
best and noblest method for governing all 
the passions, is to get the love of God root- 
ed in the heart, and to see that it maintains 
its supreme dominion there.'' What un- 
easy creatures are we made by our various 
passions ? How often do they disquiet and 
torment the soul? How headstrong is their 
tlolence, like a horse unbroken and un- 
tamed ? How sudden are their starts ? Their 
motions how wild and various ? And how 
unruly are their efforts ? Now if one had 
but one sovereign bridle, that could reach 
and manage them all ; one golden rein, 
that would hold in all their unruly motions, 
and would also excite and guide them at 
pleasure ; what an invaluable instrument 
would this be to morals ! Surely such an 
instrument is the love of God, such an in- 
valuable regulator of all the passionate 



I 



DISCOURSE 11. 61 

powers : and it will have this effect, where 
it is strong, and supreme, as it ought to be. 

You that are daily disturbed and led 
astray by rising passions of various kinds, 
come to the lectures of the gospel, come to 
the doctrine of the blessed Jesus : Come 
see the love of God displayed in its most 
surprizing and powerful colours; come 
learn to love your Maker, dressed in the 
riches of his grace : and may your souls be 
fired with divine love, till all your carnal fet- 
ters are melted off; till you exult in a divine 
liberty ; till you lead captivity captive, and 
reign and triumph over all your vicious 
affections, which had so often before dis- 
quieted and enslaved you. 

And here again we may take up a me- 
lancholy complaint, how few are there who 
are taught to regulate their passions by di- 
vine love. What wild work do these unru- 
ly powers make among mankind ! How 
dreadfully do they carrir away multitudes 
into mischief and ruin for want of this holy 
government ! How very few have attained 
this heavenly gift, this sacred principle, 
this golden rein of universal influence, that 
would hold in, and guide and manage all 
the passions to glorious advantage ! 



62 DISCOURSE ir. 



MEDITATION. 



" But it is time now, O my soul, to call 
thy thoughts away from the multitudes of 
mankind, and to look carefully into thyself. 
There is reason enough for grief and la- 
mentation indeed, if we survey the thou- 
sands round ahout us, who are mere slaves 
to their earthly passions, who let them loose 
among creatures, and show very few tokens 
and evidences of a supreme love to their 
Creator : But would it not be matter of 
far more painful, morp penetrating and 
inward sorrow, if thou shouldst carry this 
evidence, this test of divine love, into thy 
own retirements, and shouldst hardly be 
able to prove thyself a lover of God? — 
Awake, awake to the work O my heart I 
Inquire, examine, and take a strict account 
how are thy passionate powers employed ? 
Go over thy various affections, and inquire 
of all them, how stands thy love to God ? 

"Admiration is described as the first of 
the passions : It arises on the notice of 
something new, or rare and uncomm^on : 
But it never ceases nor is lost in the con- 
templation of God, v/hose glories are infi- 
nite, and in whom the holy soul always finds 
something new and wondrous. He is a rare 
and uncommon object indeed, for there is 



? 



r 



DISCOURSE II. 



63 



but one such being in heaven and earth ; 
There never was but one from all eternal 
ages past, nor ever will be but one to all fu- 
ture eternal ages. 

" Hast thou seen him, my soul, bo as to 
love him ? then thy work of pleasing con- 
templation and wonder will be still renew- 
ed : Among creatures we go on to admire 
what we love. But the love of the Creator 
will lead us to everlasting admiration. And 
if thou lovest him, thou wilt ever find some 
thing* new and wondrous in him, as thy 
knowledge of him increases. Ask thyself 
then, hast thou seen the glories and the 
graces of thy God, so as to wonder, at the 
infinite variety of his wisdom, the greatness 
of his majesty, and the condescensions of 
his mercy ? Are his displays of glory in na- 
ture and providence, in the Bible and in 
the church, and especially in his beloved 
Son Jesus, the matter of thy joyful medita- 
tion and high esteem? Does a sense of his 
transcendant grandeur and goodness strike 
thee, as it becomes a creature to be strick- 
en with the ideas of a God, that is, with a 
holy veneration, and with an awful delight ? 
The love of so sublime and infinite a being, 
is naturally turned to pleasing rdoration, 
and becomes an act of noble worship : But 
wheif earthly lovers adore their meaner 
objects, to express the strength of their 



64 DISCOURSE II. 

love, they turn idolaters, and affront God 
their Maker. Remember, O my soul, God 
alone must be adored. 

" Bat proceed now, and ask, how stand 
thy desires and wishes ? Is the favour, the 
presence, and the enjoyment of God the 
object of thy strongest desires, and of thy 
constant pursuit ? Dost thou long after a 
sense of the pardon of sin, the love of God, 
and a preparation to dwell for ever with 
him, above all things besides. 

" Yet further inquire, what is thy lieart's 
chief delight ? Are those the sweetest sea- 
sons of life when thou art brought nearest 
to God in the temper of thy spirit, in the 
lively hope of his love, and in humble con- 
verse with him ? Are the secret hours of 
retirement dear and delightful to thee, 
above all human society ? Are the workings 
of thy heart, in warm and affectionate de- 
votion, thy sweetest pleasures ? Can it be 
that ever I should love God supremely, and 
yet not find my converse with him to be 
my supreme joy? 

" Again : Are the things that relate to 
God and eternity the objects of my choice 
and love, above and beyond the things that 
relate to men and this life ? What value hast 
thou, O my soul, for the Bible, the book of 
God ? His words will be treasured up In the 
heart, and will become the sweet entertain- 



DISCOURSE II. 65 

ment of thy solitary hours, if God himself 
has the highest room in thy affections. Let 
me inquire again, how stand my desires to- 
ward the sanctuary, tOAvard the places and 
seasons of divine worship ? Am I glad when 
they say unto me, come, let us go up to the 
house of God ?" Psal. cxxii. 1. Are the 
courts of Zion my delight, because the 
blessed God manifests his power and glory 
there ? Do I love the saints of God ? Is the 
company of lively christians refreshing and 
entertaining to me, above all the idle dis- 
course of the world, or the vain merriments 
or more polite amii semen ts of the age ? Do 
I look upon the children of God with a pe- 
culiar respect, with an eye of distinguishing 
love, and that for this reason, because they 
stand related to God, and bear his image ? 
Do I feel a sympathy with them in their 
sorrows ? Do I pity and relieve from my 
\ very heart the poor in this world, who are 
I the sons and daughters of the most high 
God ? And is Jesus, the supreme Son of 
God, the highest in my esteem, and the 
dearest to my heart ? 

"Ask yet again, O my soul ; is every 

thing little and contemptible in thy eyes, in. 

j comparison of the things of God? Can any 

i thing fill up the room and place of God? Or 

i canst thou say all things are emptiness and 

vanity where God is not ? When St. Aus- 

3^ 



66 DISCOURSE II. 

tin, who was exceeding fond of the writings 
of Cicero, the Roman orator, came to taste 
the pleasures of religion, by the knowledge 
of Christ, the writings even of Cicero lost 
their relish with him, because he found not 
Christ there. How stands it now with thee, 
in respect of some of thy dearest delights 
of nature ? Are they all placed, as they 
ought to be, in thy esteem, infinitely below 
God ? Are thy best earthly joys empty and 
unsatisfying without God ? canst thou say, 
in the language of this apostle, and assume 
his triumph, " Yea doubtless, and I count 
all things but loss for the excellency of the 
knowledge of Christ Jesus, by whom we 
are brought near to God the Father ? Phil, 
iii. 8. 

" Inquire yet again, does thy love to 
God awaken and employ thy zeal and holy 
activity for his honour ? Art thou solicitous | 
to keep all his commandments, and hereby ' 
manifest thy love ? There is no evidence of 
the love of God can be sufficient or sincere, 
if this be wanting. Dost thou seek to grow 
more and more like to God ? Dost thou 
breathe earnestly after greater conformity 
to Jesus, the first and the brightest image 
of the Father ? Is it a pain to thee to find 
thyself so unlike him, whom thou lovest su- 
premely ? Love will create likeness. 



DISCOURSE II. 67 

" Let us examine thee now, my heart, 
how stand thy uneasy and painful aJfTec- 
tions ? Hast thou a rooted hatred of every 
sin ? Hast thou an inward aversion to every 
thing that displeases God ? dost thou look 
back on thy own former transgressions, with 
holy shame and sincere sorrow ? Art thou 
covered with an inward blush at the recol- 
lection of thy past follies ? Are thy sins thy 
heaviest burden, and thy most uneasy load ? 
Has thy sincere and unfeigned repentance 
been manifested by all the proper passions 
that attend a penitent, by self-abasement 
and inward confusion, by mourning in se- 
cret, and a holy displacency and resentment 
against thyself and thy folly ? And is it a 
grief and pain to thee, to see an(^ hear 
others trangress against thy God, and 
affront his law and his love ? 

" Seek yet further : Hast thou a watchful 
Jealousy over thyself, lest thou wander from 
God? A constant solicitude of mind, lest 
thou offend and displease him whom thou 
lovest supremely ? Dost thou stand afar 
off from every temptation, as one afraid to 
be defiled with sin, and dishonour thy God ? 
Art thou cautious of that company, of that 
business, of that diversion or delight which 
has before ensnared thee, and broke thy 
holy intercourse with God ? 



68 DISCOURSE II, 

4*' Ask again, O my heart, hast thou sub- 
died thy uneasy passions of anger, froward- 
n^ss and resentment, against God and 
against man, by the over-coming influence 
..of divine love ? Hast thou a submissive and 
humble carriage under hard providences 
and sore disappointments from the hand of | 
God ? Dost thou love him so well, as not * 
to' murmur at his holy conduct, nor quarrel 
with his government ? And hast thou ac- 
quired the sacred power and skill of sub- 
pressing thy wrath and revenge against 
men, by the constraining influence of the 
love of God ? Dost thou forbear and forgive 
those who oflend thee, from a sweet sense 
of the forbearing and forgiving love of God 
towar4s thee ? If thy love to God has yet . 
done little of this service, if it has not be- 
gun to make thee meek and mild, and dis- 
passionate under afllictions from the hand 
of God, or the aflfronts of men, it has not 
acquired any great prevalence in thee, and 
there is too much reason to suspect the sin- 
cerity of it. * 

" Come yet further, my soul, take a step 
forward, and look towards death and eter- 
nity. Art thou willing to cross the dark 
valley, in order to dwell with thy beloved ? 
I grant nature has its frailties and fears : I 
grant also, that the want of assurance of sal- 
vation damps the wings of thy soul, which 



DISCOURSE II. 69 

would be stretched forward to the enjoy- 
ment of God in the heavenly country; I 
would put the question therefore, in a gen- 
tle and favourable manner. Hast thou ahy 
desire to leave this sinful world, to quit all 
thy dearest hopes and interests here, for 
the sake of dwelling with God on high ? 
Suppose thou hadst a steady hope of his 
love, and the pains of death were mitigat- 
ed, hast thou an inward breathing and ten- 
dency towards the happiness that arises 
from the presence of God ? O blessed souls, 
whose love is risen to so transcendent a de- 
gree, that they are not afraid even of the 
sharpest pangs, and the terrors of death ! 
They can venture with pleasure to cross 
the swellings of Jordan, that they may en- 
ter into the promised land, and dwell in 
the city of their God. 

" What is it, O my heart, what is it in 
the word Hell that strikes thee with so 
much horror ? Is it the thought of an end- 
less separation from thy God ? What is it 
that makes the name of Heaven carry so 
pleasing a sound ? Is it because thy God 
dwells there in his fairest glory, and in his 
richest grace ? The mere dread of hell, as 
a place of sorrow and pain, and the desire 
of heaven, as a mere state of rest from 
trouble, and of some sort of unknown hap- 
piness, are no manner of evidences of any 



70 DISCOURSE II. 

love to God, much less of a supreme love, 
such as God requires. The passions of na- 
ture may be awakened by natural self-love 
at the views of heaven and hell, when set 
merely in this light : But it is the hope of 
being for ever with the Lord, that is the 
chief allurement of heaven in the eye of the 
sacred lover ; and it is the eternal absence 
of God gives hell its blackest colours, and 
its most formidable appearances. 

" Hast thou O my soul, run over all thy 
passions in this inquiry ? And what is the 
result of thy labour ? Canst thou stand this 
test ? Art thou a lover of God with all thy 
heart ? If thou find this divine principle, 
this sovereign and holy affection reigning 
Within thee, bless the distinguishing grace 
"'f^God, who has kindled this heavenly 
^ame, and cherish it with perpetual care. 
Set a guard upon every affection, lest it 
wander from its duty. O may divine love 
maintain its rightful dominion, and univer- 
sal sovereignty in my soul. Let me keep 
God always n-ear me, and watch against the 
seducing influence of tempting creatures, 
that I may ever preserve the love of God 
in its supreme fervency, and its unrivalled 
influence : Then my whole nature, with 
all its powers, shall be thine my God, fpr 
ever and ever." Amen. 



DISCOURSE III. 



The use of the passions in religion. 

We have seen already what is inclu- 
ded in " loving God with the heart, and how 
this divine love will influence all the other 
affections into a suitable and correspondent 
exercise." We proceed now to, 

The third general head oi discourse, and 
that is to show the use of thfe passions in re- 
ligion, or what advantage may be obtain e^d 
by them, or expected from them in the chris - 
tian life : And here we shall find the advar^ 
tages of them so great and numerous, a? 
will render it necessary for every one who 
professes serious religion to have the affec- 
tions of his soul engaged in it. 

Advantage I. " The passions being duly 
awakened, will set the powers of the under- 
standing at work, in the search of divine 
truth and religious duty, and render the 
knowledge of God exceeding desirable to 
sinful men." We are by nature thought- 
less of God and divine things : A little, a 
very little general knowledge of religion 
satisfies our desires, because we imagine it 



72 DISCOURSE III. 

is sufficient for our necessities. The bulk 
of mankind have their passions touched 
with earthly things, and they are ever in- 
quiring who will show us where corn and 
wine, the pleasures of sense, the posses- 
sions of this world, honours or preferments 
are to be gotten ? Too many are ready to 
join with the profane wretches, who are de- 
scribed in Job xxi. 14: **They say unto 
God, Depart from us we desire not the 
knowledge of thy ways ;" we do not want 
to knov^ much of God, nor what is our duty 
to him. 

But when the arrows of conviction strike 
through the soul, when the heart is awak- 
ened to a pathetic sense of sin, and the fear 
of divine vengeance possesses and torments 
the spirit, then it is the most importunate 
inquiry of the heart and the lips, " What 
shall we do to be saved !" Acts xvi. 30. 
How shall we escape the wrath to come ? 
How is the governing justice of the great 
God to be satisfied for our offences ? What 
is the way to be made partakers of his 
pardoning mercy ? " Wherewith shall I 
appear before the Lord, and in what man- 
ner shall I bow myself, and worship the 
most High God V Micah vi. 6. This was 
the language of the awakened jailor, who 
had just before scourged the saints of the 
Lord, the holy apostle, Acts xvi. 30. This 



DISCOURSE III. 73 

was the earnest cry of the crucifiers of 
Christ himself, at St. Peter's sermon, 
" when they were pricked to their hearts," 
Acts ii. 37. This is the language of na- 
ture, convinced of sin, and the danger of 
divine indignation. St. Paul learned all the 
terrors of the Lord, and felt all his painful 
passions in uproar, when he was struck 
down to the dust, with the dreadful and 
overwhelming glory in his way to- Damas- 
cus, Acts ix. 3. And with what intense 
and hasty zeal did he make this inquiry, 
*' Lord what wilt thou have me to do ?*' 
verse 6. And when he had learned the 
knowledge of Christ, as the only way to 
the favour of God and salvation, how 
highly doth he value it ! Phil. iii. 8. " Yea, 
doubtless and I count all things hut loss, 
for the excellency of the knowledge of 
Christ Jesus, my Lord." 

If I am awakened to a sense of sin, and 
fear the anger of God, I shall long to know 
the aw^ful extent of his power, and the ter- 
rible effects of his anger, as well as the me- 
thods of obtaining his grace. If I love 
him, I shall spend many pleasant hours of 
inquiry into his amiable excellencies. Each 
pious passion will promote its peculiar in- 
quiries. Fear and love will wander w^ith 
holy awe, and delight among his glories, 
and" be ever pursuing further knowledge of 

4 



74 DISCOURSE III. 

his perfections : If I love God with warm 
and devout affection, I shall rejoice daily 
to find new discoveries of his unsearchable 
wisdom, his all-sufficient power, his im- 
mense goodness, and the unbounded riches 
of his grace : I shall trace his wondrous 
footsteps through this beautiful creation, 
and endeavour to find his way in the track 
of daily providences : I shall survey him 
and his attributes in his book of grace, and 
dwell upon his divine features in " Jesus 
the image, and the brightness of his glory ;" 
Heb. i. 3. and I shall search further conti- 
nually into the knowledge of Christ, who is 
God manifest in the flesh : I shall dig in the 
mines of scripture for treasures of divine 
knowledge, and never grow weary of the 
work. I shall be always inquiring, " What 
shall I do to please and serve him," who is 
the object of my highest love ? and how I 
shall obtain stronger sensations and assur- 
ances of his favour, and dwell forever in 
his presence, who is the life and the joy of 
my soul ? We long still to know more of 
this transcendant being whom we love : It 
is this divine passion that animates these 
inquiries after the knowledge of God ; and 
this shall render them infinite and everlast- 
ing, because God the object of them is 
everlasting and infinite. 



DISCOURSE III. 75 

Advantage IL " The affections being 
onee engaged, will keep the soul fixed to 
divine things. The sense of them is im- 
pressed deeper on the mind, by the exer- 
cise of devout passions, and it will abide 
there much longer." Even where reason 
is bright, and the judgment clear, yet it will 
be ineffectual for any valuable purposes, if 
religion reach no farther than the head, and 
proceed not to the heart : It will have but 
little influence, if there are none of the af- 
fections, engaged. Notions of religion in 
the understanding, without any touch upon 
the passions, have been compared to the 
stars in a winter midnio^ht, brio'ht and shin- 
ing, but very cold : or rather to the meteor, 
jvvhich is called a shooting star, which va- 
nishes quickly, and is lost in darkness. 

Suppose we are convinced by calm rea- 
soning of the being of a God, of the duties 
which we owe our Creator, of his govern- 
ment of the world, and of his final judg- 
ment -; suppose we are led into a demon- 
stration or evident proof, that v/e are guilty 
ceatures, having broken the laws of God, 
and that there is no salvation for us, but in 
and by a mediator ; suppose we are really 
convinced in our judgment, that there is a 
heaven or a hell, that awaits our departure 
from this world ; that we must die shortly, 
and that we are for ever miserable without 



76 DISCOURSE m. 

pardoning mercy, and sanctifying gTace; 
all this is valuable in its kind, and is neces- 
sary in order to salvation: But if all this 
knowledge make no impression on the af- 
fections, it is not likely to abide with us, 
nor to do us much good : Knowledge wears 
off the mind, if never used. Cold, unaf- 
fecting notions, will have no powerful in- 
fluence to reform our lives. Every new 
scene of business or pleasure, brushes off 
these thoughts of religion from our souls, 
where they have not been let into the heart, 
nor possessed the passions : they " vanish 
like the morning dew or like an early cloud 
that passes away," Hosea vi. 4. 

It is one great end and design of the pas- 
sions, to fix the attention strongly upon the 
object of them, to settle the thoughts with 
such intenseness and continuance on that 
vdiich raises them, that they are not easily 
taken off. What we fear or desire, what 
we love and hope for, what we lament or 
rejoice in, will seize and busy our minds, 
and take them up perpetually, notwithstand- 
ing the importunities of other businesses 
or cares : The passions are supremely im- 
portunate, and will be heard. Now if the 
passions are strongly engaged for God, the 
world will have but little power to call off 
the heart from religion.. 



DISCOURSE III. 77 

Suppose two preachers were desired to 
minister to the same auditory, on a day of 
fasting or praise, and on the same subject 
too. One of them has all the beauty, force 
and skill of clear and calm reasoning ; the 
other not only instructs well, but power- 
fully moves the affections with sacred ora- 
tory : which of these two will best secun' 
the attention of the people, and guard them 
from drowsiness or wandering ? Surely he 
that touches the heart will fix the eyes and 
ears, and all the powers ; while he that 
merely endeavours to inform the head, will 
find many wandering eyes, and some sleep- 
ers. 

Suppose two persons have heard the same ^ 
discourse from the pulpit, which was both 
rational and pathetic. One of them is 
pleased with the fine reasoning of the 
preacher, and hath his judgment convinced 
of the necessity and importance of the duty 
which he is exhorted to practice, and goes 
no further ; the other hath also felt the very 
same conviction of his understanding by 
force of argument, and at the same time 
finds his soul touched inwardly with an 
amotion of the lively passions; he is 
awakened and surprised with an awful con- 
-cern about his past neglects, and a holy fear 
of divine anger ; he is struck to the heart 
with sentiments of piety, he is g-rieved and 



78 DISCOURSE III. 

ashamed at his folly, he is filled with zeal 
and holy purposes : Pray, which of these 
two will have the discourse dwell most upon 
their hearts ; which is like to remember this 
sermon longest, and which is most likely to 
, put it in practice ? 

This leads me to the third particular. 

Advantage III. " All the duties of holi- 
ness are rendered much easier, and tempta- 
tions to sin much weaker, when religion 
hath taken hold of the heart, and the pas- 
sions of the soul are eno-ao-ed in it/' Pas- 
sion animates all the inferior powers of na- 
ture, and strengthens them in all their ope- 
ration. It is a sort of life and fire within 
the hearts of men, which God the Creator 
hath ordained to be ever ready there, to 
give force and spirit for present action. 
lie knew our nature wanted this spur, this 
inward spring of activity. 

Suppose we had been left merely to the 
exercise of our reason and judgment, to in- 
form us when it was proper to eat and drink, 
without having any such appetites as thirst 
and hunger : It is possible indeed, that life 
might have been maintained, but we should 
have been often ready to neglect the proper 
seasons of food, and nature would have 
been supported but in a feeble and languish- 
ing manner, without such regular and con- 
stant nourishment as we want, and that too 



DISCOURSE III. 79 

with out any sensible delight. But the keen 
appetites of hunger and thirst are implanted 
in our very natures, to awaken us to take 
our solid and liquid food, and that with con- 
stancy and natural pleasure. It is for the 
same end, that all the passions were wrought 
int^ our constitution by our great Creator, 
that we might have some more vigorous 
principles than the mere power of reasoning 
to animate us to activity on all just and pro- 
per occasions. 

Suppose I were told that my house was 
on fire at midnight, and my cold reason in- 
formed me, that in a little time I and my 
goods might be consumed, it is probable I 
should think of using some method to save 
myself: But the passion of surprise and fear 
exerts itself in a moment, and hurries me 
out to make an immediate escape. Fear 
was wrought into human nature for such 
purposes as these. In such a fright we can. 
almost move mountains, and perform won- 
ders, to the utmost limits o#the strength of 
man, in order to save ourselves or our dear 
relatives from the flames. Cold reasoning, 
without passion, would have no such sove- 
reign and powerful effects. 

Thus it is in things of religion. A cold 
information that misery will be the conse- 
quent of sin, or even a rational conviction 
of the distant danger of hell, without the 



80 DISCOTJESE III. 



1 



passion of fear, would never animate the 
man to cry out, with such importunate in- 
quiries, " What shall I do to escape ever- 
lasting burnings ?" It is this passion of fear 
that constrains him to fly for his life to the 
hope that is set before him in the gospel, 
and to make him escape as Lot did from 
Sodom, without looking back on the allure- 
ments of sin. 

I might give instances of the like kind in 
the affection of divine love. I may learn 
by reason that God is to be honoured and 
obeyed, because he is my Creator and my 
Lord : I may be convinced of the beauty of 
virtue, and the excellency of religion, and 
that all the precepts of it are reasonable ; 
yet these precepts will carry but a feeble 
sway with them, and have a very imperfect 
influence on my practice, in opposition 
to all my carnal interests and corrupt incli- 
nations, if I have nothing to move me but 
the mere use of my reason, telling me it is 
a proper thin^o obey the great God. This 
will not do the work, if I have no affec- 
tionate love to God as a Father and a Sa- 
viour. 

It is a knowledge and belief of the truth 
of the gospel, joined with love to Christ my 
Redeemer, that makes me zealous to fulfil 
every duty. Christianity itself is thus ex- 
cellently described by the apostle, it is 



DISCOURSE 111. 81 

" faith working by love," Gal. v. 6. A 
mere knowledge of any person will not 
make us grow like him, but love hath an as- 
similating and transforming power : The 
divine affection of love will work perpetu- 
ally within us, and never cease till it has 
made us like our beloved object, till it has 
made us holy as God is holy,- and formed 
heaven within us. 

And when this warm love to God our 
Maker, and to Jesus our Saviour, is joined 
to a lively hope of everlasting happiness, 
how do these united passions invigorate the 
soul in duty, and bear down M. temptations 
before them? Great is the constraining 
power of these divine affections, hope and 
love : They break through all obstacles that 
stand in the way of salvation : When they 
are united together they arise to holy joy ; 
and among the saints of the Old Testament, 
as well as the New, the joy of the Lord 
was their strength, to fulfil all the duties of 
religion and righteousness," Nehem. viii. 
10. This sacred temper of mind carried 
out the patriarchs of old, and the heroes of 
the ancient church, to obey thQ call of God 
with courage, to leave their own native 
country and their friends, to wander 
through the earth as strangers and pilgrims, 
and to live upon a naked promise : This 
taught Moses to esteem the reproach of 



82 DISCOURSE III. 



it 



Christ, and the hope of the Messiah, great- 
er riches than all the treasures of Egypt: 
This enabled the pious Jews to work won- 
ders of righteousness, to venture into the 
dens of lions, to dare the edge of the 
sword, and combat the violence of lire; to 
endure the trial of cruel mockings and 
scourgings, to pass through showers of 
stones, and engines of torture, despising 
death in its most frightful forms, and not 
accepting deliverance. Tl^ese are the won- 
ders which are ascribed to faith in the 11th 
chapter to the Hebrews : But it was faith 
animated by divine love ; it was faith rising 
high in the hope of a better resurrection. 
A naked and simple belief of things unseen, 
would scarce have wrought these amazing 
effects in human nature, without some 
warm and joyful efforts of the affections of 
hope and love. 

Behold the hero of the gospel, St. Paul, 
that little contemptible figure of a man, 
bearing down all opposition before him in 
his sacred course of zeal and duty. Under 
this influence he can triumph over all the 
formidable things of nature, and the terrors 
of this world, Rom. viii. 35. " Who shall 
separate us from the love of Christ ?" Who 
shall divide our hearts from him ? Who 
shall make us weary of his service or tempt 
us away from the faith and obedience of his 



DISCOURSE III. 83 

gospel ? " Shall tribulation, shall distress, 
shall persecution, shall famine or nakedness 
or peril or sword ?" As it was written of 
the saints in former ages, so shall it be ful- 
filled again in our age, " for thy sake we 
can bear killing all the day long." The 
sheep of Christ can stand the axe, or the 
knife of slaughter : In all these things we 
are more than conquerors, through the 
grace of Christ that hath loved us. . Every 
holy martyr hath made it appear, that love 
is stronger than prisons or death : It hath 
its flames that are superior to common fire, 
and can overcome all the terrors of men. 

When this dlTvine love and hope have 
possessed the spirit, what poor and paltry 
things are all the allurements of flesh and 
sense ? How feeble and insuflicient are all 
the gay and glittering appearances of na- 
ture in this world, all the flatteries of pride 
and sensuality to draw the heart away from 
God? The holy soul can boldly with- 
stand all the enticements of sin, when di- 
vine grace has seized the affections, and 
got possession of those sprightly and active 
powers. 

What the nerves and spirits are to ani- 
mal nature, the same thing are the passions 
to the soul : They are its very nerves and 
spirits, its most vigorous and unwearied 
springs of action, both in the zealous dis- 



84 DISCOURSE III. 

charge of every duty, and the firm resist- 
ance of every temptation to sin. These ac- 
tive springs set all nature at work in the af- 
fairs of grace. 

The sanctified affections are so great a 
part of the new creature, that the very 
graces of the holy Spirit are called by their 
names. What is divine love, religious fear, 
and heavenly hope ? What is a sacred con- 
tempt and disdain of sensual vanities, and 
an immortal aversion to sin, and utter ab- 
horrence of it ? What are holy desires, 
penitent sorrows, and spiritual joys ? What 
is all this blessed catalogue of the fruits of 
the spirit, but the passions of nature refined 
and renewed by grace ? 

It is the influence of religion on the pas- 
sions, that doth in a great measure make 
the difference between the true christian and 
the mere outward professor : The mere pro- 
fessor may know as much of the doctrines 
of religion, and of the duties of it, as the 
most religious man: but he doth not fear 
and love, and desire and hope, and mourn 
and rejoice, as the true christian doth. If 
a bare rational knowledge of divine things 
were sufficient to make a true disciple of 
Christ, the greatest student in divinity, and 
especially the sharpest critic in scripture, 
would be the best christian : But it is not 
always found so ; critics and students, rich 



DISCOURSE III. 85 

in knowledge, may have cold hearts, and 
lie dead in a state of sin. 

Advantage IV. " The practice of reli- 
gion are not rendered easy, by having the 
affections employed in it, but they become 
pleasant and delightful, and every sin is 
more painful to the soul where the passions 
are engaged for God." 

If the christian be employed in holy me- 
ditation, how does the soul that loves God 
travel with delight over the various scenes 
of his glory, in the lower and the upper 
worlds ! How does he dwell upon the ma- 
jesty and the mercy of his heavenly Father; 
upon the excellencies of Christ the Saviour, 
upon his offices and his dignities from day 
to day r How pleasurably doth the mind 
diffuse itself in contemplation upon his pre- 
existent state, when he dwelt in the Fa- 
ther's bosom ; his condescending incarna- 
tion and coming into flesh and blood, the 
labours and sorrows of his life, the anguish 
and amazing love of his death, the glory of 
his resurrection, the honours paid him at 
his ascent to the throne of God in heaven, 
the efficacy of his intercession, and the joy- 
ful and dreadful appearance of the great 
Judge, when he shall come in the clouds of 
heaven to be admired of his saints, and to 
give vengeance and destruction to those 
who have ridiculed and rejected the gospel 



86 DISCOURSE III. 

of his grace ? How are the thoughts fixed 
on the sacred theme, withoat an inclination 
to rove and go astray ? How are the powers 
of imagination devoutly employed, when 
the holy passions are roused into activity ; 
when our fear, our hope, our love, our joy 
are all in happy exercise ? But if these are 
absent, and we are left merely to rational 
enforcements of duty on the mind, without 
love or affection in the heart, with what a 
cold indifference do we set about the work ? 
How fluttering are our thoughts ! How 
wandering are our hearts ! And every fly- 
ing fancy calls us away, and scatters our 
powers among a thousand vanities. 

I might instance in the duty of prayer or 
praise, when the love of the heart flames 
out into holy desires, how ready and eager 
is the soul to seek the Lord ! Not the 
shadows and silence of the midnight, not 
the early business and cares of the morning, 
can withhold the good man from calling up- 
on his God. *' With my soul have I de- 
sired thee in the night, with my spirit with- 
in me will I seek thee early," Isa. xxvi. 9. 
" And I prevented the dawning of the 
morning, and cried to the Lord," Psalm 
cxix. 147. Or if the heart be warmed with 
a sense of divine mercy, and kindled into 
religious joy, how gloriously does the 
tongue break forth into praises ! " Bless 



I "^w 



DISCOURSE IIL 87 



the Lord, my soul, and all that is within^ 
me bless his holy name : Bless the Lord, O 
my soul, and forget not all his benefits," 
Psalm ciii. 1, 2. " Seven times a-day will 
I praise thee: My heart is fixed, O God, 
my heart is fixed: I will sing and give 
praise: Awake, my tongue, my glory, 
awake to the joyful work," Psalm Ivii. 
7. 8. 

While the pious affections are duly en- 
gaged in prayer, even a common christian 
is enabled to make divine work of it :- Our 
minds never want matter, nor our tongues 
expression. Sense and language are very 
much at the call of devout passions, where 
the mind is tolerably furnished with the 
principles of religion ; and then the soul 
converses with its Maker with unknown 
delight. But when we are impelled by a 
mere precept commanding us to our knees, 
and conscience goads us on as it were to the 
task and drudgery of prayer, without any 
devout affection, how cold is the heart ! 
How languid the worship ! How dry the 
mind ! How scanty the language ! The in- 
vention and the lips strive and labour, and 
all to little purpose. In such a case, I can- 
not but think that well composed forms of 
devotion may be useful helps to awaken the 
drowsy powers, and to call up sleeping reli- 
gion. But where these powers are awake 



S3 DISCOURSE III. 

and lively, such helps are less needful- in 
our praying seasons. 

The same experiment may be repeated in 
reading the word of God. How full of 
sweetness and holy pleasure are the disco- 
veries and the promises of the Bible, when 
devout affections are at work ! How swdet 
are the histories of Abraham and David, 
the prophecies of Isaiah, and the predic- 
tions that point to Christ ! How glorious 
the epistles of Peter and Paul ! How di- 
vinely pleasing is the gospel of John, and 
the dying discourses and prayers of our Sa- 
viour in the 14th, 15th, 16th, and 17th 
chapters of this evangelist ! How full of rap- 
ture and holy transport are the Psalms of 
David ! We enter into his spirit, and we 
feel his divine sentiments and joys. But 
what a deadness, what a dryness over- 
spreads even the most delicious and hea- 
venly parts of those divine writings : what 
an insipid and tasteless thing is the gospel 
itself, when the holy passions are all asleep ! 

So it is in hearing sermons : When our 
sacred affections are awake, we dwell on 
the lips of the minister, as on the lips of an 
angel of God : every sentence seems to 
come from heaven ; and even a feeble teach- 
er, with all his infirmities, at such a season 
seems like a divine messenger, and raises 
your attention and delight. But the cause 



DISCOURSE III. 89 

is within yourselves, the activity of your 
devout affections under the influence of di- 
vine grace. 

Is not benevolence and kindness to our 
fellow- creatures, liberality to the poor, and 
especially to our fellow-christians, another 
part of our religion ? *' Pure religion and 
undefiled — is this, to visit the fatherless 
and the widow in their affliction," — James 
i. 27. '• He that loves God, must love his 
brother also," 1 Johniv. 21. But how ean 
Ave fulfil the several duties of help and re- 
lief, defence and consolation to our breth- 
ren, if we do not indulge the warm and ten- 
der affections of pity and sympathy, and 
love ? The bounty of the hands, even to 
the most distressed object, will be but scan- 
ty and small, if there be no compassion in 
the heart : but when we love our brethren 
for God's sake, and excite in our hearts all 
the friendly and compassionate affections 
towards the poor and the miserable, then 
covetiousness and self love lie down van- 
quished, and have no power to withhold the 
hand from a liberal distribution of blessings 
to those that are in need. Compassion 
melts the heart, and makes the hands flow 
with bounty and relief, 

I might give other instances also of the 
same happy effect of holy passion in the 
more difficult duties of religion, in mortifi- 
4* 



90 DISCOURSE III. 

cation of most beloved sins, as well as in 
denying our most darling interests for the 
sake of Christ. How sweet is it, saith St. 
Austin, under the power of divine love, 
how sweet is it to abstain from all the old, 
sweet and sinful delights of the flesh ? 
" Herein is our love to God manifested, 
that we keep his commandments ; and none 
of his commands are grievous," 1 John 
V. 3. 

And as the duties of religion are fulfilled 
with unusual delight, so every sin becomes 
more painful to the heart, when the passions 
are divinely tinctured. The very dwelling 
of sinful principles in the heart, the work- 
ing of unruly appetites and unholy inclina- 
tions, and the first motions of pride, and 
ivantonness, and malice, and envy, and love 
of the world, are all very grievous to the 
soul whose affections are renewed and sanc- 
tified. Every compliance with temptation 
breaks in upon the sweet serenity and peace 
of the spirit, and gives it great disquietude. 
Eead the case of the holy Psalmist and of 
St. Peter, after their folly. Thus it is in 
some measure with every sincere and live- 
ly christian ; nor is the spirit ever at rest 
after any remarkable sin, till that sin hath 
been made bitter to the soul, and till the 
soul has made fresh and warm application 



DISCOURSE- III. 91 

to the tlirone of grace, by humble repent- 
ance and faith in the blood of sprinkling. 

It is a known doctrine both in the Jewish 
and christian church, that not only the plea- 
sant, but the painful and uneasy passions of 
the heart are consecrated to divine pur- 
poses, sorrow for sin, and deep mourning, 
teach us powerfully *' that it is an evil and 
bitter thing to forsake the Lord our God ; 
and in this manner our wickedness is ap- 
pointed to correct us, and our backslidings 
to reproach us," Jer. ii. 19. By grief of 
the soul, and by the sadness of the counte- 
nance arising from it, Solomon tells us, 
" the heart is made better," Eccles. vii.~3. 
When holy David began to be " sorry for 
his -sin, when he watered his couch with 
his tears, when his eyes were consumed 
with grief, and he'roaredby reason of the 
disquietness of his heart." Psalm vi. 3, 6, 
7, he was then under the workings of re- 
covering grace. When St. Paul's first 
epistle to the Corinthians made them sorry 
for their connivance at the incestuous ini- 
quity of one of their members, he tells 
ihem, in his second letter, how necessary, 
this sorrow was, this godly sorrow which 
worketh repentance unto salvation : What 
a train of holy passions attended it! What 
indignation against sin, and the sinner! 
What holy fear of defilement by communi- 



92 



DiscotJRSE rir. 



on with such a crime, or the indulgence of 
it ! What vehement desire after cleansing 
and forgiving grace ! What revenge against 
such foul iniquity ! What zeal to approve 
themselves clear before God and man ! 
2 Cor. vii. 9, 10, 11. 

The blessed " God does not willingly af- 
flict and grieve the children of-men ;" Lam. 
iii. 33. and he would not have made the 
sorrows and the bitter groans of repentance 
so itecessary a partof the christian life, had 
he not known the painful passions of nature 
to have so happy an influence in the king- 
dom of his grace. By this anguish of the 
conscience, by these afllictions of the spirit, 
God carries on his own designs of mercy ; 
and " makes the soul partaker of his holi- 
ness," Heb. ,xii. 10. 

Advantage V, *' To employ the passions 
for God, is to take a most powerful engine 
of mischief out of the hand of sin and Sa- 
tan, and to reduce it to the obedience of 
Christ. It is the recovery of a considera- 
ble part of human nature out of dismal cap- 
tivity and bondage. The passions are the 
warmest and strongest powers of the soul. 
They are the artillery w^hereby man wages 
war either for or against heaven. The pas- 
sions by nature are devoted to the service 
of sin, and engaged on the devil's side in 
his wars against the Almighty, and they are 



DISCOURSE III. 93 

charged with the seeds of impious fire and 
thtind^r : But when divine grace hath taken 
hold on them, and employed them on the 
side of God and religion, it is like seizing 
the cannon of the enemy from their old 
batteries, and planting them in new bul- 
warks, to make war upon the devil and all 
his army. 

Fearful and impious work do the pas- 
sions make when they are engaged on the 
side of the flesh, the world and the devil. 
What bold contempt of God and all that is 
holy ! What unruly violence of love to 
vanity and sensual pleasure ! What mad 
delight in sin ! What impetuous desires of 
forbidden objects ! What malice boils in 
the heart against our neighbor, upon every 
supposed injury ! What wicked envy frets 
and rages in the soul at the welfare of 
others ! What wrath, and indignation, and 
revenge, are continually ready to be in 
arms ! And how do these hellish passions 
employ the tongue in slander and lies, and 
sometimes embrue the hands in mischief 
and blood ? Now what a glorious victory is 
it to have the vicious affections entirely 
"subdued, and the other powers of nature, 
which had been usurped by hell, seized and 
restrained, and consecrated to the God of 
heaven, and become instruments of holiness 
and peace ! To have these engines of in- 



94 DISCOURSE III. 

iquity become happy mediums of adora- 
tion and service to God, and of hourly be- 
nefits to men ! O blessed and divine change ! 
O the sovereign power of converting grace! 
Advantage VI. '' I might add, in the next 
place, that when the passions are sanctified 
and formed to a divine temper, it gives the 
gospel of Christ credit and honour in the 
world, in that it can triumph over the 
strongest powers of corrupt nature, and 
subdue them to the service of God and re- 
ligion.^' With what wicked violence were 
the passions of Paul engaged against the 
cause of Christianity, when, to use his own 
expressions, " he was exceedingly mad 
against the Saints, compelled them to blas- 
pheme, and persecuted them to strange -ci- 
ties ?'' Acts xxvi. 11. " When he breath- 
ed out threatenings and slaughter against 
the disciples of the Lord ?" Acts ix. 1. 
Now to have this man changed from a lion 
to a lamb, from a persecutor to a preacher 
of the gospel ; to hear this man propagating 
that gospel with zeal which he so lately en- 
deavoured to destroy with fury, what di- 
vine honours this event gave to the religion 
of Christ when it was but young in the 
world ? And as there were multitudes of 
such instances in those primitive days, so I 
hope they are not utterly wanting now. 



DISCOURSE III. 95 

There are, I hope, iii our age, in this ci- 
ty, and even in this assembly, some chris- 
tians that caa bear sacred witness to the di- 
vine power of the gospel in this respect. 
One can say, " how fond was I of vanity 
and sensual pleasure ? Regardless of God, 
and thoughtless of religion, with an aver- 
sion to all that was virtuous and holy ? But 
through the grace of God, the object of my 
love is changed : I delight now^ in the things 
of God : I love his word, his people, him- 
self, and his Christ, above all things in the 
world." 

Another can say, " I was greedy of mo- 
ney, and ambitious of vain glory." An- 
other confesses, " I was fretful and quarrel- 
some : I was malicious and envious ; I w^as 
wrathful and resenting ; and my ungodly 
passions "were ever ready to rise and fer- 
ment against m.y fellow-creatures : but now, 
through the influence of grace, I find my 
chief ambition is to be a child of God, and 
to exceed others in holiness : I covet the 
riches of grace, and the benefits of the gos- 
pel, above all other treasures : Now I am 
angry at myself because of sin, and angry 
at sinners when they dishonour God and 
my Saviour : I love my Lord Jesus, who 
hath procured forgiveness for me ; and I 
would love all men, and forgive them for 
Jesus' sake. 



96 DISaOUESE III. 

It is a public glory brought to the gospel 
of Christ, when our devout and pious pas- 
sions surmount all the carnal affections of 
the heart ; when the fear of God rises so 
high, and grows so strong in the soul, as to 
subdue and overcome all other fears : And 
if we fear God sincerely, we need fear no- 
thing else. It is very honourable to Christ 
and his religion, when the love of God and 
of Jesus Christ the Saviour, flames high 
above all other loves, and makes us forego 
and forget every thing which might be dear 
and valuable to us before, if it stands in 
competition with God the supreme object 
of our love. When the christian can re- 
joice and say, " I love my father and my 
mother, my wife and children, with as true 
and tender an affection as ever I did;' but 
I love God, and my Redeemer, with a 
more sublime passion.'' Neither father 
nor mother, nor dear young children, nor 
the wife of my bosom, shall withhold m.e 
from my duty to God ; and, through the 
aids of divine grace, I would be ready to 
ofier myself, with all my interest in them, 
as a sacrifice to the love of Christ. 

It is glorious indeed, to see the devout 
passions so much transcend all other pas- 
sions and appetites, all other fears, loves, 
and desires, as they that all melt away and 
vanish before the power of divine fear and 



I 



DISCOURSE III. 



97 



divine love. To see all our fondest desires, 
and our warmest passions for creatures lan- 
guish and sink, and die under the present 
influences of devout affection, as the light 
of a candle vanishes and is lost in the midst 
of sunbeams, or as the noise of a shaking 
leaf, dies and is unheard in the midst of 
thunder : O happy souls, who have arrived 
at this sublime degree of Christianity ! 
Thither let our hearts aspire daily, and ne- 
ver cease our holy labours and prayers, till 
we love, till we fear, till we desire God, in 
this glorious and intense degree. 

Advantage VIL In the last place I add 
" the sanctified passions render us so much 
the more conformable to the blessed Jesus, 
and fitter for his presence and enjoyments in 
heaven. " As the son of God put on our 
flesh and: blood, so he assumed the various 
powers and properties of human nature, the 
appetites and passions of mankind : He en- 
dured hunger and thirst, he had fear and 
love, hope and joy; nor were the more 
troublesome affections of anger and sorrow 
left out of his constitution, but they were 
all innocent and holy; they were never 
tainted with sin as ours are ; they had no 
corrupt mixtures to defile his soul. Our 
passions are like water with mud at the bot- 
tom ; when they are moved they too fre- 
quently raise the mud, and betray their im- 
5 



98 



DISCOURSE III. 



purity : But the passions of Christ were 
ever pure: like water from the clearest 
fountain in a glass of crystal, which, though 
it be never so much agitated, is still unpol- 
luted. 

These pathetic powers of his holy soul 
were ever engaged in the interest of reli- 
gion, and employed for pious purposes. He 
loved. God his Father with the most perfect 
and intense affection ; and he let the world 
know, that he loved the Father, John xiv, 
81. He rejoiced in spirit, when he gave 
thanks to God, Luke x. 21, and when God 
hid his face from him, and forsook him, his 
soul was exceeding sorrowful, even unto 
death, Matt. xxvi. 38. He was grieved and 
angry with the hypocrites and the blasphe- 
mers of his day, and looked round upon 
them with wrath and holy indignation, 
Mark iii. 5. How pathetic and vehement 
was his zeal for his Father's honour, when 
" he scourged out the buyers and sellers 
from the temple ? The zeal of the house of 
God consumed and wasted his spirits, as it 
is said," John ii. 17. " He loved his church 
with most astonishing fervor, for his love 
was stronger than death," Eph. v. 25. 
" And greater love hath no man than this, 
that one should lay down his life for anoth- 
er," John XV. 13. How passionately did he 
mourn at his own foresight of the dismal 






DISCOURSE III. 99 

distress of his enemies at Jerusalem ? " He 
looked upon the bloody city with tender 
compassion, and wept over it with tears of 
grief and love," Luke xix. 41, And what 
divine passions were exercised in his de- 
vout retirements, what holy fervors in the 
wilderness and upon midnight mountains, 
is only known to God, and to ministering 
angels. 

Thus it appears, that the more our affec- 
tions are tinctured with piety and goodness, 
and the warmer their engagement is in the 
things of God, the more nearly shall w^e imi- 
tate our glorious Redeemer. divine pat- 
tern, beyond all our imitation ! But blessed 
are those who are the nearest copyers of it* 

But you will inquire, " How will this ex- 
ercise of devout passion, fit us the more for 
the heavenly world ?" Angels are not cloth- 
ed with flesh and blood as we are, and the 
spirits of the departed saints have left this 
part of their nature behind them, in the 
grave : What efforts of passion therefore can 
there be among the inhabitants of heaven ? 

To this I answer, that though spirits de- 
parted, and angels can have no such fer- 
ments of animal nature, as go to make up 
those principles and powers which we call 
the passions, in this mortal state, yet there 
is something akin to them; which may be 
called affections in the very nature of every 



100 DISCOURSE III. 

intelligent creature : Spirits which have no 
relation to flesh can fear and hope, can love 
and desire, can rejoice and grieve, and that 
in strong and intense degrees; otherwise 
there would be no hell for the separate souls 
of the wicked, and for the punishment of 
devils ; nor would thejre he a heaven for the 
reward of the spirits of just men made per- 
fect : There cannot be a heaven without plea- 
sure, nor a hell without grief and anguish : 
Since therefore there is and must be some- 
thing of pure affection in separate spirits,that 
bears a correspondence with our passions in 
this mortal state, we may be well assured, 
that the more these passions are refined and 
sanctified, and the more they are engaged 
about divine objects in a proper manner, ac- 
1,, cording to the will of God, we shall thereby 
► acquire a greater meetness for the business 
and blessedness of heaven, and be better 
prepared for the exercise of those more spi- 
ritual affections, which belong to the saints 
departed, and to the happy inhabitants of 
the intellectual world. 

The holy apostle teaches us this doctrine 
in that sweet period of scripture, 1 Pet. iii. 
. 6, 8 : When we are " begotten again to a 
lively hope by the resurrection of Jesus 
Christ from the dead, wherein we greatly 
rejoice :" and the joy surmounts all our 
present heaviness, and bears us in conquest 



DISCOURSE III. 101 

and triumph through our manifold tempta- 
tions. It gives us a transporting view of 
praise, honour, and glory, at the appearance 
of our Lord Jesus ; whom having not seen 
we love : in whom, though now we see him 
not, yet believing, we rejoice with joy un- 
speakable, and full of glory ; or as it is in 
the original, " with unspeakable and glori- 
fied joy !" You see here that the three 
blessed affections of hope, love, and joy, 
bring the soul, to the confines of the heaven- 
ly world, set him as it were at the gates of 
paradise, fill the heart with those divine sen- 
sations which are near a-kin to the joys of 
glorified spirits. Thus by the exercise of 
the holy passions in a sublime degree, " we 
are come to the spirits of the just made per- 
fect, and almost admitted into the glorious 
presence of Jesus, our adored Mediator, 
Heb. xii. 23, 24. Let us awake, let us 
arise, let us shake ourselves out of the dust 
of this earth, and dress our souls in these 
beautiful garments : Let us long and breathe 
after these sacred sensations of refined plea- 
sure, to which the church itself is too much 
a stranger in our degenerate times. These 
are fair emblems and sweet foretastes of 
those unknown " pleasures which flow from 
the right hand of God without ceasing, 
and run like rivers, an everlasting course, 



102 DISCOURSE III. 

through all the ages of eternity, " Psalnij 
xvi. 13. 



MEDITATION. 

" How glad am I to find that not only 
my understanding and my will, but that all 
my passions may be made serviceable to 
God and religion, to my noblest designs, 
and my eternal interest ! I am sure some of 
them have had an unhappy influence to lead 
me astray from my God and my duty, and 
I am greatly pleased to hear that they are 
capable of being reduced to the service of 
my Maker, and become instruments of ho- 
liness and peace. Descend, O divine Spi- 
rit, descend into my heart ! Take hold of 
these active and sprightly powers of my na- 
ture, and bind them to thy eternal service. 
Awaken my fear of the majesty and the 
justice of God, that I may seek earnestly 
what I shall do to please him, and how I 
may obtain his favour : And let my fear be 
constant and restless till my feet are led in- 
to the paths of salvation, and I feel the con- 
straining power of divine love. 

" Let my devout passions be ever awake 
and lively when I hear the things of God 
spoken, or when I read of the momentous 



DISCOURSE III. 



103 



concerns of religion, and a life to come. 
Then the sacred truths and duties of Chris- 
tianity shall be impressed deep on my memo- 
, ry, and written there as with a pen of dia- 
mond, never to be blotted out. O may the 
warm passions, melt my soul to tenderness, 
and make me susceptive of every holy im- 
pression. May this heart of mine, this ta- 
ble of stone, be softened by devout affection, 
till all the necessary and important parts of 
religion, are written there in lasting charac- 
ters ! May my heart, O Lord, receive the 
stamp of thy gospel with all its sacred li- 
neaments, till I am become a new crea- 
ture, transformed into the image of the Son 
' of God. 

" How easy will all the duties of holi- 
ness become, and all my temptations to sin 
how weak and ineffectual, if the passionate 
powers of my nature are warmly engaged 
for God ! 

" How delightful and pleasant shall I 
then find even the difficult practices of reli- 
gion ! How hateful will every sin be in my 
eyes, and how painful to my heart, when 
divine love as a sovereign has taken posses- 
sion of it, and set all the train of affections 
at work there in its own service ! No more 
shall I complain of weariness, t)r be tired 
of religious worship: I shall say in my 
heart no more, " When will the Sabbatbbe 



104 



DISCOURSE III. 



oyer ?" Not cut short my prayers and me- 
ditations, to gratify the flesh and obey its 
corrupt influence. If I am winged with ho- 
ly passion, I shall climb over mountains of 
difliculty, in my way to heaven, or remove 
hills of temptations that obstruct my course : 
Divine love, as well as faith, can remove 
mountains. 

** O how happy shall I be when all my 
passions are sanctified ! They have been, 
I mourn to speak it, they have been wretch- 
ed engines of mischief in the land of sin 
and Satan : They have defiled my soul 
shamefully ; they have broken the law of 
my God ; they have abused his grace and 
his gospel; dishonoured my Saviour, and 
grieved his holy Spirit. When shall these 
powers of my nature be rescued from their 
sinful slavery, and be devoted to purposes 
divine and heavenly ! O that my fear and 
Tny love, my anger and my desire, my grief 
and my joy, were all appointed to their pro- 
per objects, that they might never more 
break out in an unruly manner to dishon- 
our God, or to awaken sharp anguish in my 
own conscience ! I would watch, I would 
pray, I would labour, and wrestle day and 
night against the body of sin that dwells in 
me. O for the sovereign influence of al- 
mighty grace, to correct all the disorders 
of my soul, and to turn every passion ofmy 
nature into a principle of holiness i 



DISCOURSE III. 105 

" Let the blessed gospel of Christ obtain 
this triumph over me : Let the gospel sub- 
due these rebellious powers to the obedi- 
ence of my Lord and Saviour : May the 
gospel have the glory of so divine a change ! 

" Come, blessed Saviour, set thy holy 
example before me, in a more illustrious 
and transforming light : Let all the devout 
passions of zeal and love, v^hich reigned in 
thy heart, reign also in mine : O that I 
might copy out the wonders of my zeal for 
the honour of God, and thy love to the 
race of man ! With what a divine vehe- 
mence were thy holy affections engaged in 
I worship ! But alas, how cold are all my at- 
tempts to devotion ! Kindle, O Jesus, the 
sacred fire within me : let it melt down my 
leart, and mould me into thy likeness. Let 
ny soul be made up of divine love, as a 
lappy preparative for the joys of heaven, 
md the everlasting presence of God, and 
ny Saviour.'^ Amen. 



DISCOURSE IV, 



Inferences from the usefulness of the 
passions. 

The last discourse has informed us, 
that the passions are not useless things, 
even in the important affairs of religion and 
godliness. We have seen how many and 
glorious are the advantages that we may 
derive from the right use of the affections 
in the christian life. Let us not suffer so 
momentous a theme to pass away, without 
drawing some inferences, or remarks from | 
it. 

Remark L May the passions of our na- 
ture be made so serviceable to the interests 
of our religion ? then " surely the doctrine 
of the Stoics is a very unreasonable opi- 
nion, for it teaches us to suppress all our 
passions entirely, and if possible, . to root 
them out of our natures." It is evident 
from what we have heard, that our pursuit 
of tl^e important things of religion, in this 
present state, would be very faint and cold; 
and feeble, if it were not animated by some 
of these vigorous principles, these affec- 



DISCOURSE IV. 107 

donate powers and sensations. And shall 
we abandon and destroy all these assistants 
CO piety and goodness, which are wrought 
into the very frame of our beings ? 

It is granted, that our passions in this 
fallen state, have their unhappy share of the 
general corruption of our nature : It is 
granted they are sometimes made the mis- 
chievous incentives to vice, and lead us 
astray from the path of holiness ; and, if they 
could never be reformed, they ought to be 
rooted out. But when they are once sanc- 
tified by a touch of the finger of God, and 
tinctured with a savor of piety, they be- 
come very pleasant and pov/erful springs of 
duty, both to God and man. 

A holy fear of the great God our Creator, 
and a solicitous concern what shall become 
of us when we die, is the first and most ge- 
neral spring of religion : This awakens us 
to inquire " what we must do to please the 
God that made us." When we arrive at 
some comfortable hope of our acceptance 
with God, then divine love promotes our 
piety and virtue : Then religion works 
within us by nobler principles, and it is ad- 
vanced to higher degrees, than a mere 
principle of fear could raise it : All the pas- 
sions of the man are subject to the govern- 
ment of holy love, and are employed by 
it for heavenly purposes. When we love 



108 DISCOURSE IV. 

God supremely, we shall love men also, 
who are made after the image of God : 
From a due benevolence to men, spring a 
thousand words and deeds of charity and 
pity, and godlike goodness. When our re- 
fined affections work in this manner toward 
God and men, we come by degrees to de- 
light in all that is holy ; we arrive at the 
true taste of religious pleasure, and make 
near approaches to the joys of the upper 
world, where holiness and pleasure are per- 
fect and everlasting. 

Thus it may be said that after some ge- 
neral foundations laid in the knowledge of 
God and ourselves, " Keligion begins in 
fear, it is carried on by love, and it ends in 
joy." Erroneous and unhappy is that phi- 
losophy that would banish these affections 
from human nature, which have so power- " 
ful an influence on the religious life, and 
assist our preparation for death and hea- 
ven. 

Remark II. " How happily has the blessed 
God suited his various revelations in scrip- 
ture to the powers of our nature?" How. 
well are they fitted to work upon our affec- 
tions, and to engage- those active powers of 
the soul in the interests of religion and 
godliness ! God himself, by his own me- 
thods of address to men, from one end of 
scripture to the other, proves the truth of 



DISCOURSE IV. 



109 



this discourse, and the advantage of the 
passions in things of religion. 

If God speaks of himself, how bright are 
the displays of his majesty and grandeur, to 
awaken our reverence and religious fear ? 
He is the holy One that inhabits eternity, 
who created all things by his word, the 
Lord of lords, and the King of kings : 
"He speaks, and the earth trembles, and 
the pillars of heaven are astonished at his 
reproof, " Job ix. 6, xxvi. 11. " He is a 
God fearful, or tremendous, even in his 
praises, " Exod. xv. 11. 

How surprising are the discoveries of his 
power and knowledge, to raise our wonder ! 
" He ranks the stars in their order, and 
calls them all by their names, and not one 
fails to appear at his call : " Psalm cxlvii. 4. 
' His eye surveys all the creation, and 
oiows the thoughts of the heart afar off;" 
Psalm cxxxix. 2. " He takes up the isles 
is a little thing, " Isa. xl. 15. " He touch- 
es the mountains and they smoke, " Psalm 
iiv. 32. Who can stand before hinv, or lift 
ip the hand against him and prosper ? 

If he manifest the riches of his mercy and 
yoodness, how is the divine language suited 
o strike upon all the springs of our hope 
md love, and to allure our hearts to him ? 
■ How excellent is thy loving kindness, O 
iod ?" Psalm xxxvi. 7. " In his favour 



110 DISCOURSE IV. 

life, and his love is better than life, " Psalm |i^ 
Ixiii. 3. He has magnified his love towards 
us, and the exceeding riches of his grace^ , 
that v^hile we were enemies and rebels, he 
sent his Son to die, in order to redeem us 
from death. 

If he reveal to us Christ Jesus, his be- 
loved Son, in what a glorious light does he 
place him before our eyes, to command our 
veneration and honour, our faith and our 
fervent affection? He " is the brightness 
of his Father's glory, and the express image 
of his person," Heb. i. 3. " He was with 
God before the foundation of the world, for 
by him. the worlds were created, " John i. 
3. He is the man '' in whom dwells all the 
fulness of the godhead bodily, " Col. il. 9. 
He is " God manifest in the flesh," 1 Tim. 
iii. 16. He came down from the Father's 
bosom, not to condemn the world, but to 
expose his owm life and blood for our sakes, 
to make his soul an offering for our sins, 
and to sustain unknown anguish and sor- 
rows, in the room and stead of such rebels 
as we are. 

If he opens heaven in the gospel, and 
brings life and immortality to light, what 
thrones of glory, what crowns of righteous- 
ness does he set before us ? What mansions 
of paradise, what rivers of pleasure flowing 
from the throne of God, what rich fruits of 



DISCOURSE IV. Ill 

the tree of life, what blissful visions in the 
presence of God and Christ, what blessed 
society of angels and holy souls are descri- 
bed, as the enjoyments of this heaven, on 
purpose to draw out our strongest desires 
towards it, and our joyful hope, and our 
.; warmest zeal in the pursuit of it ! 

When he gives us a view of hell, how 

dreadfully are the executions of divine 

wrath described there ? What a gnawing 

worm in the conscience that never dies, 

what a fire that is never quenched ? What 

burning lakes pf fire and brimstone, kindled 

by the breath of an angry God ? What 

troops of devils and damned spirits must 

be our companions there, " and the smoke 

I of their torment ascending forever and 

jever?" Kev. xiv. 11. How happily are 

these divine descriptions suited to awaken 

us out of security, and to excite in us the 

I passion of fear in the highest degree, that 

I knowing the terrors of the Lord, we may 

j stir up all our powers to flee from the wrath 

I to come, and seek reconciliation to God by 

I the blood of Christ ? 

I If sin be mentioned in scripture, in 
^ what odious colours is it set before us ? It 
] was sin that ruined our first parents, and 
(drove them out of paradise, and spread 
[death and misery through all this lower 
world : It is the unrighteousness of men 



112 DISCOURSE IV. 

that has awakened and revealed the wrath 
of God, in all the terrible instances of it, 
from the ancient apostacy and fall of angels 
in heaven, to the final destruction of this 
world by fire, and the punishment of men 
and devils in hell forever : And all this 
that sin might appear exceeding sinful, and 
raise in us the highest hatred, and utmost 
aversion. 

The great and blessed God, who formed 
us at first, perfectly knows our frame ; he is 
well acquainted with all the powers and pas- 
sions of human nature, and the design and 
use of them all : And therefore when he 
wrote those holy messages to us by his 
apostles and his prophets, he does not only 
reveal things to our understandings, which 
reason could not find out, and then leave 
us to make the best of them; buthe warm- 
ly and powerfully addresses himself to the 
affectionate principles within us, in order to 
make the discoveries of his grace pierce 
deeper into our souls, that he might reco- 
ver us from our guilt and misery, and per- [ 
suade us to partake of his salvation. 

Remark III, We may learn from this 
discourse, " how much it is the business of 
a minister of the gospel, to engage the af- .. 
fections of his hearers, and to bring them 
over to the service of God and religion." 
It is granted that the first work is to inform 



DISCOURSE IV. 



113 



the understanding, to teach mankmd what 
they are to believe concerning the great 
God, and what duties they owe to him. 
To this end the preacher must not only 
draw his doctrines from the light of nature, 
but from the Word of God, and bring them 
down to the capacities of his hearers. It is 
his constant business to explain the word of 
God to men, to propose the naked truth 
with the strongest reasons to support it : 
He must endeavour to strike light into the 
mind, and convince the reason and judg- 
ment of men ; he must make it appear that 
they are guilty before God, and that there 
is no way of relief or hope, but in and by 
Jesus, the great Mediator ; and thus lead 
sinful and perishing men into the knowledge 
and faith of Christ, as an all sufficient Sa- 
viour : All this is a necessary and indispen- 
sable part of this work ; but jt is not the 
whole of it. When the understanding is 
enlightened, the passions must also be 'ad- 
dressed ; for God has wrought thesfe pow<9^. 
ers into human nature, that they might l^e 
the vital and vigorous springs of actioii and 
duties. 

If the judgment be never so much con- 
vinced, yet while the affections remain un- 
moved, the work of religion yvill be begun 
with difficulty, and will drive on but very 
heavily. This the prophets atidjhe japos*^ 



4 



. ^.. ^^^^'^t 






114 DISCOURSE IV. 

ties well knew ; and the great God, who 
employed them, knew it too, and therefore 
Jie sent them armed with the powers of na- 
tural and divine oratory, to reach the in- 
most affections, to penetrate the heart, and 
to raise holy commotions in the very centre 
of the soul. What mean all the promises 
of the gospel, but to work upon our hope, 
and to raise our highest expectations ? 
What means the dreadful language of sp 
many severe threatenings, but to shake us 
out of our security, and to rouse our fears ? 
If there had been no such principles as hope 
and fear, in man, I am persuaded there 
would scarce have been any such things as 
promises and threatenings in the book of 
God. The word of the Lord is compared 
to a fire and^ hammer, Jer. xxiii. 29. " Is 
not my word like as a fire, saith the Lord, 
and like a hammer that breaketh the rock 
in pieces." Audit ought to be delivered 
and pronounced by the preachers of it, in 
such a manner, as may break the rocky 
hearts of stubborn sinners, as may fright 
them from their beloved iniquities, by the 
terror of everlasting burnings. 

The holy scripture is a cabinet of divine 
c\iriosities, full of admirable allurements to 
invite and entertain awakened minds : It 
shotrM be so happily unfolded and display- 
ed by the preachers of it, as to represent, 



DISCOURSE IV. 115 

in a noble manner, the amazing grace and 
love of God, and the blessings of the gos- 
pel ; and that with such a holy fervor, as 
to light up a divine flame of desire, hope 
and love, in the souls of all that hear it. 

To what purpose were the fancies of the | 
holy writers enriched from heaven with so • | 
bright and various a treasure of sacred " 
images, but to raise the devout passions of 
their readers, by flashing upon their imagi- 
nation with divine light ? Their words are 
sun-beams, that not only difTuse a sacred il- 
lumination around the eye of the soul, but | 
kindle the heart into life and zeal. To ^ 
what end doth all the pomp and oratory 
display itself in their writings : To what 
end do they use all the arts of trope and 
figure, all the beauteous, the alluring and 
the terrible colours that nature can afford, 
and that metaphor can borrow ? Is it not all 
with a design to strike the soul of man in 
its most passionate powers, and spread vi- 
tal religion through the inmost recesses of 
the heart. 

Let the ministers of the word, who ar^ 
zealous for the honour of God, for the glo- 
ry of Christ, and for the success of thei| la- 
bours, read the writings of the holy pro- 
phets, night and day, and make them theit 
pattern, transferring the beauties of the law 
to the ministry of the gospel. The prd^ 



116 DISCOURSE IV. 

phets do not merely tell us in a dry and cold 
manner, that sin is an evil thing, but they 
terribly denounce the thunder of the wrath 
of God against it, and pour down his ven- 
geance on the heads of guilty rebels, to 
work upon our fear, to affright us from sin, 
and hasten us to fly to the arms of divine 
mercy. Nor do they merely say to us, 
that God is merciful ; but in a most delight- 
ful and inviting manner, they display the 
boundless mercies of God, and the work- 
ings of his bowels of compassion, in all the 
pathetic language of tenderness, as though 
he were made of flesh and blood as we are. 
When our blessed Lord himself came 
down on earth, to become a preacher of his 
Father's wrath and mercy, what eternal 
woes does he denounce against hypocrites 
and impenitent wretches ? How gently does 
he invite the weary and heavy-laden sinners 
to come to him, that they may find rest ? 
Matt. xi. 28. How widely does he un- 
fold the gates of his Father's mercy, and 
4hat even to murderers, and adulterers, and 
thieves, and blasphemers, that sinners of 
the largest size may enter in and be par- 
takers of divine salvation. How happily 
does St. Paul imitate his blessed Master ! 
*' Knowing the terrors of the Lord he per- 
suaded men, arid he beseeches them in the 
moBt endearing language, in Christ's stead, 



DISCOURSE IV. 117 

to be reconciled to God," 2 Cor. v. 11. — 
18 — 20. In wl^at pathetic language doth he 
set before us the glorious love of God, in 
contriving the recovery of fallen men, and 
providing grace for them in Christ Jesus, 
before the world began ; and in saving them 
by such a surprising method of mingl-ed se- 
verity and mercy, as the death and agonies 
of his most beloved Son ! And all this on 
purpose to melt or soften our aifections into 
repentance, love, and gratitude ! How won- 
derfully do the sacred writers attack the 
passions on all sides, if by any means they 
may save a soul from hell ? Happy preach- 
ers, who approach this divine pattern ! 

Can any of us now content ourselves to 
bring cold and languid discourses into the 
pulpit, with this bible under our hands ? 
Will not all the sacred fervors of these in- 
spired preachers reproach us to our faces, 
while we read and explain their sermons ? 
Shall we go on to affect a calm and stupid 
politeness of phrase, in the very face of 
these warm and heavenly orators ? Can we 
be content any longer to be the cold and 
lifeless rehearsers of the great and glorious 
things of our religion ? Can we go on to 
speak to perishing sinners, who lie drowsy 
and slumbering on the brink of hell, in so 
soft, so calm and gentle a manner, as though 



118 DISCOURSE IV. 

we were afraid to awaken them ? What 
shall we say to these thingi^b? Does divine 
love send dreaming preachers to call dead 
sinners to life ? Preachers that are content 
to leave their hearers asleep on the preci- 
pice of eternal destruction ? Have they no 
such thing as passion belonging to them ? 
Have they no pity ? Have they no fear ? 
Have they no sense of the worth of souls ? 
Have they no springs of affection within 
them ? Or do they think their hearers have 
none ? Or is passion so vile a power, that it 
must be all devoted to things of flesh and 
sense, and must never be applied to objects 
divine and heavenly ? Who taught any of us 
this lazy and drowsy practice ? Did God or 
his prophets, did Christ or his apostles in- 
struct us in this modish art of still life, this 
lethargy of preaching, as it has been called 
by a late writer : Did the great God ever ap- 
point statues for his ambassadors, to invite 
sinners to his mercy? Words of grace, 
written upon brass or marble, would do the 
work almost as well. Where the preach- 
ers become stone, no wonder if the hearers 
are moveless : But let the ministers of the 
living word, who address men upon mat- 
ters of infinite concernment, show if possi- 
ble, that they are infinitely concerned about 
them. 



DISCOURSE TV. 119 

This leads my thoughts to the next re- 
mark. 

B^mark IV. " How kindly has the grace 
and wibdom of God dwelt with us, in ap- 
pointing meiv of like passions with our- 
selves, to beconm his ministers, and our 
teachers in the things of religion ! Men, 
who have the same natural affections, who 
can feel within themselves all the train of 
devout passions, and express it in their ho- 
ly ministrations ! Men, who are subject to 
the same sins and follies, and are capable 
of the same religious feai, and penitent 
sorrow ! Men, who stand in need of the 
same salvation, and must be trained up to 
heaven by the exercise of the same faith, 
and love, and hope. 

If angels had been made the only mes- 
sengers of the gospel, angels, who have no 
flesh and blood, ho communion in the same 
animal nature, no share of our fears and 
sorrows, no interest in the ^ame redeeming 
mercy and pardon, they could not have ex- 
pressed all the same passions, nor given us 
such an example of them in themselvesi 
But a minister of the word, taken from 
! among men, has been in a sinful state, and 
is now become a sincere christian, or h^ 
should be so. . He is supposed to have his 
iiown soul filled with love to God; he has 
^felt his own fears awakened by the terrors 



120 



DISCOURSE IV. 



of the Lord, and the threatenings of eter- 
nal misery ; he has found his trembling so«i 
ejicouraged to hope by the rich prom^'^es of 
grace; he has felt his own hp-^ied rising 
against sin, his delight raisp^ by the views 
and expectations of the I'avour of God, and 
eternal happiness i?i his presence. How 
well is such a teacher suited to set the ter- 
rors of hell, the evil of sin^ and the riches 
of divine grace in Christ Jesus, before the 
eyes of sinful men, who have the same na- 
tural passions vith himself; and to turn 
these affectionace powers of his hearers into 
a religious channel, by representing these 
awful objects in a pathetic manner. 

The preacher should be an example to 
the hearers, and then he preaches with most 
power and success. It is a well known say- 
ing, " If you would draw out my tears, you 
must first weep yourself." How cold and 
dull and unaffected with divine things, is 
mankind by nature ? How careless and in- 
dolent is a, whole assembly, when the 
preacher appears like a lifeless engine, pro- 
nouncing words of law or grace ! When 
he speaks of divinie things, in such a dry, 
in such a cold and formal manner, as 
though they had no influence on his own 
heart ! When the words freezes upon his 
lips, the hearts of his hearers are freezing 
also : But where we find devout affection 



t 



DISCOURSE IV. 121 



mingled with solid argument in the dis- 
course, there the lips of the preacher seem 
to speak light and life at once, and he helps 
to communicate the holy passion all around 
him, by feeling it first himself. 

And here I am sure, we, who are ho- 
noured with sacred employment, have rea- 
son to examine our hearts, to reflect on our 
indolence, our lifeless conduct, and our cold 
labours in the pulpit ; and mourn to think 
how imperfectly, and how ineffectually we 
perform the awful work of the ministry. 
And shall our own affections still be so un- 
raised and unmoved, while we speak of the 
great and momentous things of God, and 
Christ, and religion, of death and judg- 
]iient, of heaven and hell? Shall we always 
preach with such a deadness of spirit, such 
a shameful absence of divine fervour ! May 
the blessed God forgive your preacher, and 
may you forgive him ; and may sovereign 
grace raise a warm flame of vital rfeligioain 
his heart, and communicate it to all yOur 
souls ! 

Remark V. If the passions are so useful 
in the solemn affairs of religion, " there is 
yet further occasion to admire the msdom 
vind grace of God, that he has appointed se- 
veral such institutions or parts of worship 
to belong to our holy religion, as are suited 

6 



i 



122 DISCOURSE IV, 

to work upon our senses, and thereby to 
awaken pious passions within us ? 

Besides the voice of public prayer, and 
the affectionate speech and language of 
preaching the gospel, we are also taught 
and exhorted to sing the praises of God 
with holy melody. What a multitude of 
exhortations are found in the book of 
Psalms, to make a joyful noise unto the 
Lord, and to sing new songs before him in*^ 
the kingdom of the Messiah. The advice 
of St. Paul in the New Testament, echoes 
to the harp of David, and calls upon us to 
speak to one another, as well as to our- 
selves, " in psalms and hymns and spiritual 
songs, and to sing and make melody with 
grace in our hearts to the Lord. " Eph. v. 
19. and Col. iii. 16. St. James gives the 
same encouragement : " If any be merry or 
cheerful, " let this passion of joy express 
itself in a devout manner, by singing 
psalms, James v. 13. How happily suited 
is this ordinance to give a loose to the de-» 
vout soul in its pious and cheerful affec- 
tions ? What a variety of sanctified desires,' 
and hopes, and joys, may exert themselves 
in this religious practice, may kindle the 
souls of christians into a holy fervour, may 
raise them near to the gates of heaven, and 
the harmony of the blessed inhabitants 
there ?^ Nor are pions sorrows utterly ex- 



DISCOURSE IV. 123 

eluded from this ordinance : There are 
tunes and songs of mournful melody to so- 
lace the humble penitent, and to give a 
sweetness to his tears. 

And besides all this, there are the two 
glorious and sacred ordinances of Baptism 
and the Lord's Supper, wherein divine 
things are exhibited to us in a sensible man- 
ner by figures and emblems, which are de- 
signed to impress animal nature, and by the 
eyes to awaken the passions of the heart. 

How proper an emblem is Baptism, to 
represent our being washed in the blood of 
Christ ? and the pouring out of water on 
the face or head, how well is it suited to 
represent the pouring out of the Spirit of 
God on men, and by this means to awaken 
the holy affections of hope and joy ? 

How happily is the Lord's Supper con- 
trived by divine wisdom, to represent the 
death and love of our blessed Saviour, and 
the benefits that we derive from his suffer- 
ings ? " Jesus Christ crucified is evidently 
set forth before our eyes : " Gal. iii. L He 
is represented even in his bleeding and dy- 
ing love, while the bread is broken, and the 
wine poured out before us. OhoW' should 
we loose the springs of pious passion at 
such a season ! How should our love to our 
Redeemer kindle and rise high at the sight 
of the sufferings vof the Son of God, who 



124 DISCOURSE IV. 

took our flesh and blood, that he might be 
capable of dying ! that his flesh might be 
torn, and cut, and bruised, that his blood 
might be spilled for our sakes, that he might 
bear such agonies as belonged to sinful 
creatures, with a gracious design to deliver 
us from misery and everlasting death ? For 
ever blessed be the name of Jesus, who has 
suffered such pangs and sorrows in our 
stead; and blessed be his wisdom and 
grace, who has appointed the continual re- 
petition of such an ordinance, such a lively 
memorial of his dying love, to touch all the 
springs of religious affection within us. 

Remark VL Since the passions of human 
nature have so considerable an influence in 
matters of religion, then we may justly in- 
fer that youth is the proper time to set about 
the important work of religion, when the 
passions are warm, and lively, and active. 
After we have been well instructed in the 
principles of Christianity, if we can but en- 
gage these sprightly powers of our natures 
betimes, on the side of God and godliness, 
we lay a happy foundation for the practice 
of piety all our lives. It is of admirable 
and unknown advantage, to have all the 
passions of the heart tinctured deep with 
heaven and religion in our early days. By 
this means :virtue and piety will be fixed and 
rooted in the soul ; it will stand the blasts 



m 



DISCOURSE IV. 125 

of violent temptation, and bring forth the 
divine fruits of holiness through the fol- 
lowing years. We shall be better prepared 
to combat every opposition ; we shall be 
better secured against the snares that beset 
our youth ; we shall resist the gay allure- 
ments of the world, and the flattering vani- 
ties that attack our senses and our souls in 
this dangerous season of life. It is the 
great cunning and the design of the devil 
and the world to work upon the warm pas- 
sions of youth, to engage them in the ser- 
vice of sin and folly : Happy are those who 
are possessed of a divine antidote against 
this poison ! who have their passions all 
watchful and armed, ready to resist the as- 
saults of hell, and to disappoint every attack 
that is made on virtue and religion ! 

Remark VIL Is there so much advan- 
tage to be expected from the passions in th^ 
practice of religion ? Then " how much do 
we lose both of the profit and the pleasure 
of religion, for want of the engagement of 
our passions therein !" Therefore it is that 
virtue and godliness seem to carry with 
them so dull and heavy an aspect in the 
world; therefore they appear so little invi- 
ting, because there are so few christians, in 
this degenerate age, that have these affec- 
tionate powers of the soul deeply tinctured 
^with the things of God. We live at a poor, 



126 DISCOURSE IV. 

low, cold rate, when we only talk of Christi- 
anity as a matter of dispute, and practice the 
outward devoirs and ceremonies of it, as a 
matter of custom and form, while the heart 
and the passions of it have little share in 
our Christianity.. If our love and desire, our 
hope and our joy, are all laid out on the 
things of sense and time, and we leave only 
a few cold reasonings to be employed in the 
most awful and sublime things of God, and 
heaven and eternity, it is no wonder we find 
so little of the pleasure of godliness, and 
that religion gains so little reputation, and 
so few followers. O what blessed lives did 
the primitive disciples of Christ enjoy ! 
What divine satisfaction, what heavenly 
glory, what convincing power attended their 
practice, whe.n their whole souls, with ail 
their affections, were devoted to God and 
Christ, and engaged in the affairs of the up- 
per world ! They lived on earth like the 
children of heaven, and brought a foretaste 
of the pleasures of the upper world, into 
these lower regions. O when shall these 
holy seasons return again ? When shall the 
noble principles of the christian faith ani- 
mate all the powers of nature, and make us 
live as becomes the followers and the wor- 
shippers of the holy Jesus. 



DISCOURSE IV. 127 



MEDITATION, 



*' Many and useful are the lessons, which 
I have now learned from the happy influ- 
ence of the passions, in the important affairs 
of my salvation. Blessed be God that I 
was not born in heathenism, and left merely 
to the teachings of the philosophers. Even 
the Stoics, who were some of the best of 
them, deprive us of all the advantage of pi- 
ous affections, and all the pleasurable sen- 
sations that may be derived from religion ; 
while they teach us to root the passions, if 
possible, out of our natures. My soul shall 
mourn in secret for my sins, and be ashamed 
of my follies : My heart shall fear and love 
the Lord my God, and rejoice and hope in 
Jesus my Saviour : My spirit with all its 
warmest affections are thine, O my God, 
for ever and ever ! 

" Let all the sects of philosophy hide 
their heads, and lie silent : give me the 
bible, where God himself speaks to me by 
his prophets and apostles : How divinely 
excellent are their writings ! With what 
sovereign influence do they address my 
fear and my hope, by the discoveries of a 
hell and a heaven! How powerfully do 
ihey awaken my repentance for past sins, 
and melt my soul into holy sorrow ! In 



128 . DISCOURSE IV. 

what an illustrious light do they set the 
majesty of the blessed God, and command 
my humble adoration ! How do they dis- 
play the wonders of his wisdom, and the 
riches of his grace in Christ Jesus, to attract 
all my powers of desire and love ! What a 
blessed foundation have the scriptures laid 
for an infinite variety of devout inferences 
and pathetic meditations, suited to my own 
case ? There I find the divine truths that 
can relieve my soul under every distress; 
and there I learn the affectionate and devout 
method of applying them. In every need- 
ful hour I will go to the book of God : God 
and his holy book are my life, and my ex- 
ceeding joy: Let my soul abide and live 
upon the divine or awful variety and trans- 
porting objects, which are set before me in 
those sacred pages. Let me be taught with 
sacred skill to spread abroad my thoughts 
on the right-hand and on the left, and to 
expatiate on these holy and heavenly 
themes : They are fountains of life, and 
every stream flows with holiness and conso- 
lation. O mey all my affections be under 
the command and influence of these sacred 
writings ; and while they give me intense 
delight, let them animate me to uncommon 
zeal in the practice of e /ery duty ! 

" And why should not our minister? in all 
their labours of the sanctuary, imitate their 



DISCOURSE IV. 129 

inspired predecessors, the apostles and the 
prophets, in rising the pious passions of all 
that hear them ? Why should they not talk 
to men in such warm and pathetic language 
as God himself uses ! Doth not the great 
God, the author of our nature, know what 
methods are most effectual to fill our hearts 
with divine sentiments, to draw us near to 
himself, and prepare us for heaven ? Has 
he condescended to give us so many glori- 
ous patterns of preaching in his Avord, and 
shall not all that are employed in the divine 
work copy out the spirit and fervor, the 
life and power of these inspired examples ? 
O may this dull and heavy heart of mine, 
ever enjoy the happiness of a fervent and 
lively ministry, that may not only enlighten 
my understanding, but warm my heart ! 

" And since God has ordained that I should 
be instructed in divine things by men of like 
passions with myself, may those whom pro- 
vidence has appointed to instruct me, be al- 
so examples of pious affection ; that while I 
see their hearts filled with religious feir and 
holy love, and joy in the Lord, I may also 
be smitten .with the same religious passions, 
may catch the holy fire, and find all the train 
of sprightly and devout sensations convey- 
ed to the very centre of my soul ! 

" Blessed be the wisdom and grace of my 
God, that has added sensible signs and em- 



130 DISCOURSE IV. 

blems to the articles of the christian faith. 
Let me remember, that I Avas washed with 
water, the name of the Father, and Son, 
and Holy Spirit ; and let me be ever jealous, 
lest I defile myself again : And when I at- 
tend the sacred institution of the supper, let 
all the springs of pious passion be let loose, 
while I view the Son of God, suffering for 
my sins : Let me feel the meltings of holy 
sorrow and the highest and strongest efforts 
of gratitude and love, to that gracious and 
divine person, who gave himself to death 
for me. 

" Have I heard that youth is a proper sea- 
son for lively religion, because the passions 
of nature are then vigorous ; Lord, seize 
all my affectionate powers in this season of 
youth, and sanctify them to thyself. Pre- 
vent the influence of the wicked world by 
the early impressions of thy grace, that I 
may resist the vain allurements of flesh and 
sense, by having those sprightly powers of 
nature engaged first on the side of religion. 

"Or if my years of youth have enjoyed this 
rich and divine favour, I would remember 
the early loving-kindness of my God, and 
praise his name in my advanced years with 
joy and thankfulness. 

" Grant, O Lord, that I may never lose the 
pleasure, of religion, by suffering my affec- 
tions to grow cold and languid. Quicken 



DISCOURSE IV. 131 

this lifeless spirit of mine by daily influences 
from above : Shine upon my soul, O sun of 
righteousness : awaken my drowsy powers 
to active piety and zeal, and let all my pas- 
sions conspire with my reasoning faculties 
to promote the interests of religion in my 
own heart and life, and to diffuse the favour 
of godliness all around me." Amen. 



DISCOURSE V. 



The abuse of the passions in religion. 

In the two last discourses, we learned 
the use of the passions in matters of reli- 
gion, and what advantages may be expected 
from them, in the christian life : We pro- 
ceed now to the fourth general ; and that 
is, to inquire into the abuse of the passions 
in religious concerns, or when the exercise 
of our affections in the things of God may- 
be pronounced irregular, and in what man- 
ner they should be limited and restrained, 
and put under better conduct. 

Abuse I. Then are the passions irregu- 
larly exercised, "when we suffer them to 
influence our opinions in religion, and to 
determine our judgment in any points of 
faith or practice." The passions were 
made to be servants to reason, to be govern- 
ed by the judgment, and to be influenced 
by truth ; but they were never given us to 
decide controversies, and to determine what 
is truth, and what is error. Even the best 



DISCOTTRSE V. 133 

affections, and those that seem to have a 
strong tendency toward piety, are not al- 
I ways safe guides in this respect ; yet they 
are too often indulged to sway the mind in 
its search after truth or duty, as I shall 
1 make it appear in several instances. 

1. Suppose a person should be exceed- 
ingly affected with the unlimited goodness 
I and abounding grace of G od : if, by this 
' pious affection towards God and his good- 
ness, he is persuaded to think that God has 
no such severe vengeance for sinful and re- 
bel-creatures, and that he will not destroy 
such multitudes of mankind in hell as the 
scripture asserts ; or that their punishment 
! shall not be so long and so terrible as God 
I has expressly declared ; here the passion of 
. love and esteem for the divine goodness, 
acts in an irregular manner, for it takes off 
the eyes of the soul from his awful holi- 
jness and his strict justice,' and the un- 
I known evil that is in sin. It prevents the 
mind from giving due attention to God's 
j express words, and to those perfections of 
I the divine nature, and his wise and righte- 
ous government, which may demand such 
dreadful and eternal punishment, for the 
jrebellion of a creature, against the infinite 
1 dignity of its creator and governor. 
[ 2. Suppose a christian has most power- 
tful impressions made on the passions of fear 



134 DISCOURSE V. 

by the tremendous ideas of God's majesty, 
and his punishing justice, and thence he 
concludes that the Great God will pardon 
no wilful sins, that he will forgive no re- 
peated iniquities, no sins after Baptism and 
the Lord's Supper, or after vows or solemn 
engagements ; that he will have no mercy 
upon apostates, even though they turn to 
him by repentance : This is yielding up 
truth to the passion of fear, and abuse of 
our religious dread of the majesty of God; 
for such an opinion runs counter to the 
great design of the gospel, which assures us 
that " Christ came to save the chief of sin- 
ners," 1 Tim. i. 15 : to remove the gutlt 
of wilful and repeated sins, and to provide 
forgiveness for some of the most profli- 
gate rebels, even for all that renounce their 
rebellion. 

3. Some pious persons have had such an 
aflfectionate zeal to honour God, that they 
have been led by this passion to contrive 
various forms of service and ceremony, 
gay and costly rites, with long and painful 
exercises of devotion, which God never 
appointed, and have introduced a number 
of them into his worship. A childish 
fondness to please the great God with bo- 
dily services, has tempted them to forget^ 
his own divine prerogative to prescribe how 
men should worship him. They have been 
blinded with this sort of fondness for cere- 



DISCOURSE V. 135 

mony, in such a degree, as to lead them far ' 
astray firom the divine simplicity of wor- 
ship, which the New Testament has ap- 
pointed. 

4. Some persons, out of a passionate de- 
sire to honour Christ, and ascribe the whole 
train of their blessings and salvation to him, 
have been tempted to think that they are to 
do nothing towards their own salvation, 
but to lie still and be saved without any la- 
bour or care of their own ; so that they 
have sought no more after sanctification, 
and holiness in themselves, than they have 
sought to make atonement for their own 
sins. But this zgal has much darkness in 
it, an^l betrays them into a gross mistake, 
as though they could not ascribe their sal- 
vation sufficiently to Christ, unless they 
fancied that he came to save them iu 
their sins, rather than to save tliem from 
sin. 

5. It is possible that a person may have 
so high an esteem and so excessive a love 
for some near relation, some christian 
friend, somewise and pious minister of the 
gospel, that he sees no fault in them : He 
imitates all their practice, as though they 
were perfect patterns ; he receives all their 
opinions for certain and divine truths, and 
believes every thing which they teach, as 
though they were infallible, without com- 



136 DISCOURSE V. 

paring it with the Bible, which is the only- 
test of truth in matters of revealed i^ligion. 
This affection of love to ministers or chris- 
tians is certainly irregular, when it tempts 
us to set up their judgments, their practices 
and their dictates, in the room of the words 
of God. 

6. Again, it is the same culpable indul- 
gence of our passions, to sway our judg- 
ment, and bias our understanding, when our 
souls are warmed with the holy fire of love 
and devotion under a particular sermon, 
and we cry out, " This is the best sermon 
that ever was preached, or the finest that 
ever was composed." Qr, perhaps, your 
devout affections flag and languish under a 
sermon ; you sit indolent and unmoved, 
and then the sermon goes for a poor dry 
discourse, and the man that delivered it for 
a dull and heavy preacher. Each of these 
hasty and irregular judgments, built on the 
passions, is very common to christians, and 
ought to be corrected. 

7. I might add another instance a-kin to 
the last ; and that is, when our devout affec- 
tions of fear and hope, of holy love and 
heavenly delight, are raised in a place of 
public v/orship, whether at the established 
church or among the several denominations 
of the protestant dissenters, and immediate- 
ly we conclude, " This is the right way of 
worship, this is most agreeable to the gos- 



DISCOURSE V. 137 

pel, and these people are the only true 
church of Christ." How weak is this rea- 
soning ! And yet how many are there, who 
have been determined both in their opinion 
and practice for or against such a particular 
community of christians, or mode of wor- 
ship ; and that for their whole life-time, 
merely by the effects that one or two atten- 
dances at "such a particular place of wor- 
ship have had on their affections ? 

These arguments drawn from the pas- 
sions, have been often employed to support 
idolatry and transubstantiation, and all the 
wild inventions of men in the worship of 
God. What sighs, and tears, what warm 
affections of sorrow and joy have been some- 
times produced by some ingenious orators 
in the Roman church, in their sermons at 
Lent, when they have held up a crucifix be- 
fore the face of the people in the midst of 
their discourse ! While they set forth the 
sufferings of our Saviour in most pathetic 
language, the preiiehers have fallen down 
on their knees, and embraced and adored 
the wooden image : The natural affections 
of the hearers have been awakened in a ve- 
ry sensible manner, and being mingled 
with some thoughts of Christ and religion, 
they have fallen down and worshipped the 
idol, and have imagined all this to be pure 
devotion and piety towards God and his 
6^ 



13S DISCOURSE V. 

Son Jesus : and after all, they have made 
their lively passions a sufficient argument 
that God approved of all their fooleries, 
though, in his own word he hath expressly 
forbidden the worship of images. ; 

I have read of another instance ; when a 
poor devout creature hath come to the sa- 
crament of the mass of the Romish church, 
and her passions being raised to a rapturous 
degree, as she thought, by the presence of 
Christ there, under the form of the conse-' 
crated wafer, she hath boldly declared, 
" should all the men on earth, and all the 
angels in heaven, join together to assure me 
that God himself was not there, I would 
not believe them, for I have seen him, and 
felt his divine presence." What a wretch- 
ed and mischievous abuse of passion is this, 
when persons shall suffer it to lead them to 
such unwarranted and sinful modes of wor- 
ship, and persuade them to believe such 
strange doctrines, as are not only contrary 
to the express word of God, but a perfect 
contradiction to nature, sense, and reason ! 

Instances of this kind might be still mul- 
tiplied. I have mentioned these few only 
to make it appear how unreasonable a thing 
it is to form our opinions in religion by the 
influence of the passions. 

Abuse IL Then must the affections in mat- 
ters of religion be pronounced irregular, 



DISCOtJRSE V. 



139 



*^ when they run before the understanding, 
or when they rise higher toward any par- 
ticular object than the judgment directs." 
As in the foregoing particular, I told you 
that the passions were not designed to be 
directing powers of the soul, in the search 
of truth or duty ; so neither are they made 
to rule all within us ; but they are to be 
governed by reason and •understanding: 
And in whatsoever instances they assumea 
superiority over the understanding, or run 
before it, they are excessive and irregular. 
Let us enter into a few particulars. 

1. Some persons, as soon as they begin 
to find farther light dawning upon their 
minds, and are let into the knowledge of 
some doctrine or sentiment which they 
knew not before, immediately set their zeal 
to work : Their zeal is all on a flame to 
propagate and promote this new lesson of 
truth, before their own hearts are well esta- 
blished in it upon solid reasonings, and be- 
fore they have considered whether it be a 
doctrine of great importance, and whether 
it merit such a degree of zeal. How com- 
mon a case is it among christians, and too 
often found among ministers of the gospel, 
to give a loose to their affections at the first 
glimpse of some pleasing opinion, or some 
fresh discovery of what they call truth ? 
"They help out the weakness of the proof by 



140 DISCOURSE V. 

the strength of their passions, and by the 
pleasure they take in the opinion they have 
embraced. This confirms their assent too 
soon, and they grow deaf to the arguments 
that are brought to oppose it. They con- 
strue every text in the scripture to support 
this doctrine, they bring in the prophets and 
apostles to maintain it. They fancy they 
see in it a thousand verses of their Bibles, 
and they pronounce all men heretics that 
dare maintain the contrary opinions. Their 
conduct in this matter is so vehement, as 
though every gleam of light were suffici- 
ent to determine their faith, because it hap- 
pens to fire their affections ; they grow so 
warm about it, as though every opinion in 
religion were fundamental ; and so fiery is 
their zeal, as though every mistake deser- 
ved the severest censures. 

Nor is this the case of the christians 
only, with relation to the new opinions they 
receive : There are too many who tak:e up 
most of their articles of faith at first with- 
out due examination, and without suffici- 
ent argument : Their veneration for great 
names, or their affection to a particular 
party, has determined their opinions long 
ago : Their passions and other prejudices 
have formed their schemes of doctrines, 
with the neglect or abuse of their under- 
standings and yet they pronounce as posi- 



DISCOURSE IV. 141 

lively upon truth and error, as though they 
were infallible. Happy are those whose 
faith is built on better foundations ! • 

2. Again, there are some persons, w^hen 
they begin to be convinced that such a par- 
ticular practice is culpable or unlawful, their 
indignation is too soon awakened, and rises 
too high ; immediately they condemn it, 
as inconsistent with salvation : Their ha- 
tred of it grows as violent as if it were 
blasphemy or idolatry : They are ready to 
break out into hard speeches and railing ac- 
cusations against all that practice it, and 
pronounce them apostates and sinners of 
the first rank. The sudden rise and warmth 
of their passions does not suffer them to 
consider that there are some faults and fol- 
lies that a good christian may be guilty of, 
through ignorance or inadvertence ; there 
are some sins that do not carry in them such 
malignity and poison as to destroy all our 
Christianity. 

3. There have been some weak christians, 
when they have heard a sermon, or read a 
discourse full of sublime language and mys- 
terious darkness, and especially, if the style 
and manner has been very- pathetic, who 
have been raptured and transported, as 
though it contained the deepest sense, the 
noblest truths of religion, and the highest 
discoveries of grace and the gospel : 



142 DISCOURSE V. 

Whereas, perhaps, there may be scarce any 
thing in it which has a just agreement with 
reason or scripture ; but when well exam- 
ined, it proves to be a mere jargon of words, 
a mixture of unintelligible and unmeaning 
sounds, with some affectionate airs among 
them, whereby their passions were fired, 
and that without knowledge, and beyond 
all reason ; And it is well, if after these 
flashes of affection and violent transports, 
they are not deluded into shameful iniqui- 
ties. This has been the case of some high 
pretenders in elder and later days. They 
have spoken great swelling words of vanity, 
they are murmurers and complainers 
against the common rank of christians, but 
they " walk after their own ungodly lusts ; 
they turn the grace of God into lascivious- 
ness, and they allure others into lusts of the 
flesh, through much wantonness ; and while 
they promise liberty, they are the servants 
of corruption," 1 Pet. ii. 18, 19 ; and Judge 
4, 16, 18. 

4. This irregular exercise of the affec- 
tions running before reason, is eminently 
exemplified also or another weak sort of 
people, who are very sincere in the main, 
but if they read an awful and terrible threat- 
ening, or if they hear it pronounced or the 
pulpit with a just degree of authority and 
proper accent, their fears are raised in an 



DISCOURSE V. 143 

j excessive manner, and their soul is filled 
I with long sorrows and doubtings : Or, if 
. they happen to read or hear a sentence of 
; comfort, they are transported with sudden 
joy, and raise almost to assurance of the 
love of God : They give themselves up to 
the sudden efforts of passion, before they 
I suffer themselves to inquire, according to 
scriptural grounds, whether this text of 
threatenings, or whether the other senten- 
ces of comfort, do really belong to them or 
no. 

There are many other cases, wherein it 
I is evident, that the affections in the things 
! of religion get the start of the understand- 
I ing, and run far before it. But I proceed. 
Abuse HI. It is a very gross abuse of the 
[ affections, "when we encourage them to 
; rise high, and grow very warm about the 
lesser things of religion, and yet are con- 
tent to be cold and indifferent in mat- 
. ters of the highest importance." There 
' are too many christians whose warmest zeal 
is employed about the mint, the annise, and 
the cummin of Christianity, Mat. xxiii. 23. 
and have few passions awakened or engaged 
^ in the weighty things of the law or the gos- 
pel. They are furiously intent upon specu- 
lative notions, and some peculiar opinions, 
• that distinguish the little parties of christen- 
dom, and crumble the church to pieces ; 



i 



144 DISCOURSE V. 

Their fears, their hopes, their wishes, their 
desires, their grief and joy, are all employ- 
ed in party-quarrels and in a strife of words : 
But they are thoughtless and indolent about 
the momentous duties of love to God and 
Christ, of justice to men, of charity to fel- 
low creatures and fellow christians. So a 
sickly fancy is fond of trifles, and careless 
of solid treasures : So children have their 
little souls wrapped up in painted toys, 
while the matters of manly life and neces- 
sary business awaken no desire, no delight 
in them. 

Suppose a man mourns to see the church 
of England lose ground in the nation, or to 
see the assemblies of Protestant dissenters 
grow thin and decrease, and yet he finds not 
his soul grieved, and his heart mourning 
over the atheism and profaneness of the 
land, the drunkenness and lewdness, the 
growing heathenism and infidelity of thd 
age : Or suppose a christian triumphs to see 
the controversy about Baptism well man- 
aged, and his joys arise, according as his 
own opinion is bravely supported, while at 
the same time he takes little pleasure to 
hear of the conversion of a sinner, or that a 
wicked family is grown religious. What 
shall we think of such a person ? Is not his 
religion in a childish and sickly state ? Are 
not his passions, even about religious ob- 






DISCOURSE V. 145 

I jects, managed in a very irregular manner, 

' and worthy of a just and severe reproof? 
Abuse IV. There is also another evil 
conduct of the affections, in the matters of 
religion : and that is, " when they express 
themselves in an improper or indecent man- 
ner, and especially in such a way as is un- 
natural and uninstituted, foolish and ridicu- 
lous, savage and barbarous, contrary to the 
dictates of reason and human nature, or the 
word of God." 

V Take for instance some of the persecu- 
ters and idolators, the bigots and enthusi- 
asts of the church of Rome. And I wish 
such persecution and bigotry, enthusiasm 

. and idolatry, were never found among any 
other sects of christians. 

1. With w^hat furious and burning bar- 
barity do Popish persecutors express their 
zeal for their religion ! They arm their 

, tongues and their pens with bitter re- 
proaches and gall against those who divide 
from their communion, and would reform 
their gross corruptions ; and they still pro- 
fess it is out of love to Christ, and to the 
souls of men, that they imprison, cut, burn, 
torment, and destroy their fellow-christians. 
O my soul, come not into their secrets, nor 
learn such unrighteous and bloody zeal ! 

2. Survey Popish idolators. They ima- 
gine they can never show their affectionate 

7 



146 CiSCOtTRSE V. 

devotion to Christ sufficiently, without mak' 
ing images of a crucified man, and placing 
them continually in their sight, in order to 
pay their worship to Christ by those unap- 
pointed mediums. Sometimes they wear 
these little idols in their bosom, near their 
heart, and then they think they manifest 
how much their heart loves him. They 
kiss these wooden baubles, or their silver 
iigures, with a strange childish fondness, 
and sometimes bedew them with their tears, 
to show their inward affection to Jesus their 
Saviour. There may be much animal pas- 
sion, much commotion of nature and the 
flesh in these practices, with very little spi- 
ritual love. Sometimes they made pictures 
even of God the Father, and then perform 
their devotions toward them with forbid- 
den ceremonies, and break God's second 
commandment to express their love to him. 
Strange and preposterous expressions of 
love, to practise what he forbids so often in 
his word, and that upon severe penalties ! 

3. Turn your eyes now to the Romish 
enthusiasts. God forbid that I should so con- 
demn all that are educated in that church, 
as though there was no sincere devotion 
among them, though the church itself is 
abominally corrupt : but it is well known, 
that when some of these devotees have fan- 
cied themselves possessed with such a sub* 



BISCOTTRSE V. 147 

linae love to God, that they have thrown 
themselves into odd postures and strange 
disorders of bod}', and appeared more like 
distracted persons than sober christians, as 
though it must be something not human 
that must express their divine affections. 
Others have imagined they could never do 
nor suffer enough to manifest the inward 
fire of that love to God which dwelt in their 
heart, and they have contrived what tor- 
ments they should inflict upon themselves, 
as they used to express it, for the love of 
God. 

Others, to show their sorrow for having 
eyes that offended him, have not only worn 
sackcloth upon their skin, but they have 
scourged themselves, till they have been 
covered with blood; they have bound them- 
selves with vows to travel barefoot, and to 
make long and tedious pilgrimages to dis- 
tant lands. Some have sent themselves to 
death by voluntary starving ; others have 
tortured and destroyed themselves with ex- 
cessive thirst ,* and either made their bodies 
miserable, or put an end to life to show their 
love to God. These are wild and frantic 
superstitions indeed, extravagant methods 
of expressing any devout passion, and most 
of them utterly unlawful. Let us remem- 
ber that the religion which God teaches, 
has nothing in it contrary to the light of na-' 



148 DISCOURSE V. 

ture ; nor must our inward piety break in 
upon the rules of reason and decency, when 
we would express it by any outward signs. 

There are some religious affections, 
which are very properly expressed and 
manifested in the common way, whereby 
nature usually expresses those inward sen- 
sations of the soul. Godly sorrow natural- 
ly vents itself in groans and tears, Psalm ii 
vi. 6. Holy joy sometimes by a smile of f| 
the countenance, and often by the voice of 
sacred melody : And this not only appears 
in the example of the royal Psalmist, but in 
the precepts of the New Testament, Eph. 
V. 19. James v. 13. "If any be merry, let 
him sing psalms." Pious and earnest de- 
sires of the presence of God and of his fa- 
vour, are signified by stretching of the arm 
towards him, or lifting up the eyes and 
hands to him. Psalm Ixviii. 81. and xxviii. 
2. and cxxi. 1, 2, Repentance and shame 
are naturally signified by downcast eyes or 
blushing, Luke xviii. 13. Ezra ix. 6. 

Some of the stronger outward appear- 
ances, and vehement tokens of inward holy 
passion, are indeed rather to be indulged in 
private than in public worship : But in all 
our behaviour in this respect, let us take 
heed that the inward affection is sincere, 
and is the real spring of all the outward 
signs and expressions. Let us see to it, 
that we indulge not that practice which our 



DISCOURSE V. 149 

Saviour so much condemns in the hypo- 
crites of his day, Matt. vi. 16. Let us 
make no sad faces, nor put on dismal airs, 
nor smite the breast with the hand, and dis- 
figure our countenances, merely to make 
the world believe that we are penitents. 
Nor let us make ourselves remarkable in 
puMic and mixed company, by turning up 
our eyes to heaven, to tell the world how 
often we pray in the midst of our secular 
affairs ; though secret prayer may and ought 
to be sometimes rising to God, and we may 
lift an eye to him, while we are among men : 
Nor in public worship should we use fre- 
quent and loud groan ingSj to persuade our 
neighbours that we are more deeply affect- 
ed with divine things than they; though 
devout affection will sometimes vent a gToan 
or a sigh. 

But above all, let us take heed lest we 
make use of these outward colours and 
forms of passion, to cover the want of in- 
ward devotion and piet}^ We should al- 
ways make our religion appear to the world 
with a natural and becoming aspect ; and in 
a decent dress to invite, and not forbid those 
who behold us. Let us take care that we 
do not disguise our holy Christianity, nor 
make it look like an irrational thing, by un- 
manly or unbecoming sounds or gestures ; 
lest we thereby expose ourselves to the 



150 DISCOURSE V. 

charge of hypocrisy, and give up our holy 
profession to the ridicule and contempt of i 
the profane world. 

Abuse V, It is an irregular management 
in the affairs of religion, or an abase of de- 
vout passions, when we content ourselves 
with the exercise of these inward and affec- 
tionate sensations of the mind, while they 
have no influence .on the holiness of oar 
conversation. Consider, my friends what 
were the passions made for? Not merely 
for the sensible pleasure of human nature, 
but to give it vigour and power for useful 
actions. I have bat a poor pretence to be,., 
a sincere lover of Christ, if I rejoice to hear . 
his name repeated often in a sermon, and 
say never so many affectionate things of 
him;in the language of the book of Canti- 
cles, and yet take no care to keep his com- 
mandments : Whereas this is the appointed 
way wherein Christ has reqaired his disci- 
ples to manifest their love to him : John 
xiv. 15. '' If ye love me, keep my com- 
mandments ;" chap. XV. 14. " Then are 
ye my friends, if ye do whatsoever I com- 
mand you." In vain do I pretend to gious 
sorrows, in vain do I mourn for some great 
and grievous sin, in my secret retirements, 
or in public worship, if my life be spent 
among the gay follies and variiiies of the 
world; if I run into new temptations when- 



DISCOURSE V. 151 

f soever the world beckons to me, and follow 
every son of mirth that waves the hand of 
invitation. 

True Christianity, where it reigns in the 
heart, will make itself appear in the purity 
of life. We should always suspect those 
flatteries of affection, those sudden inward 
sensations of sorrow or delight, which 
have no power to produce the fruits of ho- 
liness in our daily conversation. The fruits 
of the Spirit, are found in the life and the 
heart together, as they are described, Oal. 
V. 22. ^' Love to God and man, joy in holy 
things, peace of conscience, and peace with 
all men, as far as possible, long suffering, 
gentleness, goodness, faith, that is faithful- 
ness, meekness, temperance, and particu- 
larly a crucifixion of all sinful affections." 
Let us never content ourselves with any 
exercise of lively devotion, unless we feel 
our corrupt affections in some measure sub- 
dued thereby. 

O how shameful a sight is it, and what a 
reproach to the profession of the gospel, to 
see a christian just come from church and 
holy ordinances, where his devout affections 
have been raised and moved, and immedi- 
ately to find him breaking out into vain, 
earthly rarerriment, and carried away with 
idle and sensual discourse ? What a scan- 
dal is it to our religion, to see some zealous 



152 BIbCOURSE V. 

professors coming down from their closet, 
where they fancy they have been favoured 
with holy raptures, and enjoyed muck 
converse with God ; where they think they 
have exercised repentance and love, and 
holy desires, and yet immediately fall into 
a fit of rage against their servants or chil- 
dren, for mere trifles, and express their 
wrath in very unchristian language and in- 
decent behaviour ! This is an open con- 
tradiction to their profession ; and the shop 
and the parlour, or perhaps the kitchen, 
give the lie to the pretences of the closet. 
O glorious evidence of a disciple of Christ, 
where all the pious passions join to resist 
every temptation ! Where divine love keeps 
warm at the heart, where it purifies the 
whole behaviour, and exalts the life of men 
near to the life of angels ! 

Abuse VI. That must certainly be a cul- 
pable conduct, with regard to our religious 
affections, when they are suffered to en- 
trench upon other duties either to God or 
man, and withhold us from the proper busi- 
ness of our place and station in the world. 
Though devout passions should be indulged 
at proper seasons, yet they should not so far 
govern all the powers of nature, and en- 
gross the moments of life, as to make us 
neglect any necessary work, to which the 
providence of God hath called us. 



DISCOURSE V. 153 

j 4' This is the case, when persons find so 
much sweetness in their religious retire- 
. ments, that they dwell there too many hours 
of the day, and neglect the care of their fa- 
milies, the conduct of their children and 
servants, and other necessary duties of life, 
and let all things run at random in their 
household, under the excuse of religion and 
converse with God : Though I must con- 
fess this is so uncommon a fault in our god- 
less and irreligious age, that it may almost 
pass without censure. 

It is the same culpable conduct, when 
christians experience a sacred and affection- 
ate relish of public ordinances, and they are 
tempted to run from sermon to sermon, 
from lecture to lecture, in order to maintain 
their spiritual pleasures, w^ith a slight and 
careless performance of relative duties. It 
is yet more criminal in persons of low- 
circumstances in the v/orld, who would 
spend all iheir time in hearing or read- 
ing good things, or at some religious as- 
semblies or conferences, while they, gross- 
ly and grievously, neglect their common 
duties of providing for themselves and 
their children. They are ready to ex- 
pect, that the rich should maintain them, 
while they make their devout affections 
an excuse for their shameful idleness and 
sloth. Let us remember there is a time 



154 DISCOURSE V. 

for working, as well as a time for praying, 
or hearing : " Every thing is beautiful in 
its season," Eccles. iii. 11. 

This sort of excessive and irregular af- 
fection appears also eminently, when, out of 
pity to the poor, or love to the public wor- 
ship of God, dying persons leave vast lega- 
cies to the building of churches and hospi- 
tals, and endow alms-houses liberally, while 
their near kindred, and perhaps their own 
descendants, are in a starving condition, or 
want the conveniencies of life. He that 
takes no care of his nearest relations living 
or dying, is in that respect worse than an 
infidel. God does not love robbery for 
burnt-oifering, nor does he permit us to 
abandon our natural affection to our fellow- 
creatures, to shov/ our love or zeal for our 
Creator in such instances as these. 

Abuse VIL Religious passion is then cer- 
tainly exercised in a very irregular and cri- 
minal manner, when we suffer it to degene- 
rate into carnal and vicious affections, and, 
as the apostle expresses it in another place, 
when we begin in the Spirit, and end in the 
fiesh. Gal. iii. 3. Examples of this kind 
are too comnion in the present age of chris- 
tians. 

1. Zeal may turn into wrath and fury. 
A high veneration for the glorious -truths of 
the gospel, and a warm zeal for the defence 



DISCOURSE V. 155 

of them, has too often degenerated into ma- 
G Jice and indignation, against those who dif- 
fer from us in religious sentiments ; and 
J that too in matters which are of small im- 
) portance to practical godliness. Pious zeal 
.against dangerous errors is a just and lau- 
dable thing, when it carries moderation ^nd 
good temper with it, and does not break 
out into wrath and malignity against the 
persons of those who are unhappily betray- 
ed into those mistakes : but, it becomes a 
guilty passion, and hateful in the eyes of 
God our Saviour, when it breaks all the 
bonds of charity and christian love. The 
:flaming bigot and the persecutor, come in 
naturail}^, at every tuni for their share o£ 
this caution and reproof, as abusers- of the 
passions in the things of God and religion. 
^Yhen v^^e come sometimes into Vvwship- 
ping assemblies, where a man of burning 
zeal leads the worship, we find the wild-fire 
of his own passions spreading through the 
whole congregation. Is it not a shameful 
thing to hear the preacher railing against 
his brethren, because they differ a little from 
him, and will not use some unscriptural 
modes of expression, or will not admit 
some favourite explications of a verse of 
sci'ipture, or will not consent to practise 
seme lesser forms and rites of worship ? 
And it is a matter of equal shame to see 



156 DISCOURSE V. 

many persons, who imagine themselves to 
be christians of the first rank, take a mali- 
cious pleasure to hear such scurrilous re- 
proaches, and public railing against their 
fellow-christians, and curses denounced 
against them, because they differ in cere- ) 
monies and phrases. And the crime is cer- 
'tainly the greater, if these opinions and 
forms, wherein they disagree, are but t)f » . 
small importance. This is a wretched^] 
abuse of passion in the things of God : and 
yet so deceitful is the heart of man, and so 
given up to self-flattery, that perhaps both 
the preacher and the hearers vainly presume 
they are expressing a sacred love for divine 
truth, and paying sublime service to God 
and their Saviour. What madness is mix- 
ed with mistaken zeal ! 

2. There is another instance of the abuse 
of the passions, which is very near akin to 
this, and may stand next in rank ; and that 
is, when we behold the vices of men, with 
holy aversion and hatred, and immediately 
transfer this hatred to their persons, where- 
as we ought to pity and pray for them : Or 
when we see a fellow christian fall into sin, 
and because we hate the sin, we hate the 
sinner too, and suffer our hatred to grow 
into disdain and irreconcileable enmity, and 
that even though the offender has given 
signs of sincere repentance. This is not 



DISCOURSE V. 157 

christian zeal, but human corruption ; and 
such criminal indulgence of the passions, 
which ought to be mortified, if ever v/e 
would be imitators of the Holy Jesus : He 
hated even the least sin, but loved and sa- 
ved the greatest of sinners, and delighted to 
receive penitents to his love. 

3. It is a culpable exercise of the pas- 
sions, when holy emulation degenerates 
into envy. At first we admire the virtues 
of others, we respect their persons highly, 
we imitate their conduct, and aspire after 
the same degrees of piety and goodness ; 
we have a holy ambition to equal them in 
every grace, and in every virtue, and if 
possible to exceed them : all this is right 
and worthy of praise ; but when I fall short 
of the attainments of my neighbour, and 
envy him on the account of his superior 
character ; when I feel an inward displea- 
sure against my brother, because his gifts 
or graces shine brighter than mine, then the 
holy affection degenerates, and becomes a 
lust of the flesh, instead of a fruit of the 
Spirit. 

4. I might give another instance also of 
this kind; and that is, when love to fellow- 
christians begins on a spiritual account, be- 
tween persons of different sexes, and there 
is a mutual delight in each other's company 
and pious conversation ; but without great 



158 DISCOURSE V. 

watchfulness, this christian love may be in 
danger of degenerating into vicious desires 
and corrupt passions. 

5. It may be worth our notice also, that ' 
there is another danger of the degeneracy 
of a devout passion, when persons of a pi- 
ous and cheerful spirit have taken great de- 
light in singing the praises of God, and 
meet together at the stated seasons for this 
purpose ; but in time, this has insensibly 
sunk into the pleasure of the ear, into a 
mere natural relish of harmony, and delight 
of sounds well connected. This may have 
easily happened, when fine instruments of 
church-music have been used to assist psal- 
mody, or when persons pride themselves in 
too nice and delicate a skill in singing, in 
too exquisite a taste in harmony, even 
though the words which they sing may be 
holy and religious. 

To guard against these dangers, let chrisj 
tians frequently enter into their own hearts 
and endeavour, as far as possible, to exam- 
ine their spirit and conscience, to distin- 
guish between their inward workings of 
piety, and the mere exercises of animal na- 
ture, or the working of corrupt affection, 
and set a constant guard upon their hearts 
in this respect. 

Abuse VIIL The last thing I shall men- 
tion, wherein some christians are guilty ot 






DISCOURSE V. 159 

! 

an irregular conduct with regard to their 
affections in matters of religion, is this, 
" when they live entirely by their devout 
passions, and make these the only rules of 
self-inquiry concerning their temper, their 
habitual state of soul, and their present 
frame of spirit, and concerning every thing 
that belongs to their Christianity." Such 
persons have little regard to the growth of 
their knowledge, the improvement of their 
understanding in the things of God, the 
steady and fixed bent of their will toward 
religion, and the constant regular course of 
a holy conversation. They seem to make 
all their religion consist in a few warm and 
pious affections. There are two sorts of 
persons subject to this mistake. 

1. Awakened sinners, who feel their pas- 
sions of fear and desire excited by some 
convincing sermon, or awful providence, 
and the rich doctrines of grace suited to 
their case and state, raise in them some 
hopes of heaven, and sensitive commotions 
of joy. This may continue for many 
months, and incline them to infer that they 
are converted from sin to God ; and bein^ 
also in a great measure reformed in their 
lives, they imagine they are new creatures, 
and all is safe for eternity : whereas they 
never had a heart fixed in the love of God, 
and in the hatred of every sin ; they never 



160 DISCOURSE V. 

became hearty and resolved christians : and, 
in a little time, their devout passions die, 
and all their religion vanishes, for it had no 
root. 

2. There are also some real converts, 
who are but weak, and live too much by 
their passions. If their hope and desire 
and delight, are but engaged and raised 
high in their secret retirement, or in public 
worship, then they are good christians in- 
deed in a heavenly state, and they think 
exceeding well of themselves : but if, at 
any time, there is a damp upon their pas- 
sions, through the indisposition of their 
animal nature, when they feel not a great 
degree of animal fervour powerfully assist- 
ing their pious exercises, they are ready to 
pronounce against themselves ; they sink 
into great despondencies, and imagine they 
have no true grace. 

Such christians as these live very much 
by sudden fits and starts of devotion, with- 
out that uniform and steady spring of faith 
and holiness, which would render their re- 
ligion more even and uniform, more ho- 
nourable to God, and comfortable to them- 
selves. They are always high on the wing, 
or else lying moveless on the ground : they 
are ever in the heights or the depths, tra- 
velling on bright mountains with the songs 
of heaven on their lips, or groaning and la* 



DISCOURSE V. 161 

I 

i bouring through the darkvallies, and nevet 
i walking onward as on an evil plain toward 
^ heaven. 

. There is much danger, lest such sort of 
i professors as these two, which I have men- 
I tioned, should deceive themselves, if not in 
judging of the truth of their graces, yet at 
; least in their opinion of the strength or 
weakness of them, for they judge merely 
i by their affections. Let us watch against 
, this danger, and remember that though the 
I passions are of excellent use in religion, yet 
I they were never designed to stand in the 
place of reason and judgment, or to supply 
the room of an enlightened understanding, 
a sanctified will, and a conversation attend- 
ed with all the fruits of holiness. 

Thus I have finished what I designed to 
say concerning the abuse of the passions in 
religion. 

The remarks which I shall make on this 
head of discourse are these three. 

Remark I. " Those christians are best 
prepared for the useful and pious exercises 
of their passions in religion, who have laid 
the foundation of it in a regular knowledge 
of the things of God." Let your under- 
standing therefore be fully persuaded of the 
necessity and excellency of religion, of the 
duties you owe to God, as your maker and 

governor ; let all your reasoning powers be 
7# 



162 DISCOURSE V. 

convinced of the evil of sin, of the holiness 
and justice of God, of the danger of eternal 
death, of the relief and hope that is held 
forth in the gospel of Christ, of the neces- 
sity of faith and holiness, in order to eter- 
nal happiness ; and amidst all the work- 
ings of devout affections, maintain a con- 
stant exercise of your reason and judgment. 
The scripture itself was not given us to 
make the use of our reason needless, but to 
assist its operations, and to render it more 
successful in our inquiries into the things 
of our everlasting welfare. Knowledge and 
affection should go hand in hand, in all the 
affairs of religion : the more we know of 
God, and the things of the upper world, we 
shall have the stronger spring for our holy 
passions, and a more secure guard against 
any excesses and irregularities in the exer- 
cise of them. 

Remark IL " As it is the business of a 
preacher to assist the devout passions, so it 
is part of his work to guard his hearers 
against the abuse of them." 

We have granted and maintained that it 
is the business of every sacred orator, to 
raise the affections of men toward the things 
of God; let him therefore manage his di- 
vine arguments in such a manner, as to 
awaken the fears, the hopes, the desires, 
the penitent sorrows, and the pious joys of 



DISCOURSE V. 



163 



the whole assembly, in a sublime degree ; 
but, in order to secure them from excesses 
and irregularities of every kind, let him lay 
the foundations of their religion in clear 
ideas of divine things, and in a just and 
proper explication of the holy scriptures. 

When he has a mind to lead his hearers 
into any particular religious sentiments, 
which he firmly believes to be true, and 
which he supposes useful to their edifica- 
tion, let him not begin with their passions, 
and address himself to them in the first 
place : he must not artfully practise upon 
their warm and animal powers, before he 
has set these doctrines or sentiments of his, 
in a fair and convincing light, before the 
eye of their understanding, and their rea- 
soning faculties : the aflfections are neither 
the guides to truth, nor the judges of it, nor 
must the preacher set them to their sprightly 
and fervent work, till he has informed the 
mind by clear explication and sincere argu- 
ment. The sun in the heavens gives us a 
fair document in this case : his light comes 
before his heat : the dawn of the morning 
grows up by degrees, and introduces the 
fervours of noon. So let the preacher dif- 
fuse his light over the assembly, before he 
kindles their warm affections. Let him 
convince their reason and judgment of the 
truth of every article of religion, which he 



164 DISCOURSE V. 

persuades them to believe ; ]et him show 
the duty and the necessity of every part of 
holiness, which he prescribes for their 
practise. Let him imitate that noble pat- 
tern of divine oratory, Apollos at Ephesus, 
who was an eloquent man, and mighty in 
the scriptures ; he was fervent in spirit, and 
could raise the passions of those that heald 
him, yet he was willing to kindle the flame 
of his own oratory by the light of his own 
understanding, and when he himself " had 
learned the way of God, more perfectly, he 
mightily convinced the Jews by divine ar- 
gument, and showed them by the scriptures, 
that Jesus was the Christ," Acts xviii. 24 — 
28. Then there was a proper way made 
for his following zeal and fervour to display 
themselves. i 

Remark III. If the passions are of such J| 
eminent service in religion, and yet they are * 
in danger of unruly excesses, " how much 
need have we to beg earnestly at the throne 
of grace, that they may be all sanctified ?" 
It is only the sanctifying influence .of the 
blessed Spirit, that can excite them in a due 
degree, and can give them proper limits 
and regulations. It is nothing but divine 
grace can raise them to due height on all 
just occasions, and yet preserve them from 
any irregular conduct and unhappy effects. 



DISCOURSE V. 16o 

In this sinful state of corrupt nature, we 
are averse to the things of God : our pas- 
sions are violent tow^ards sensible objects, 
but are hardly moved by the most important 
discoveries in religion. It is God alone 
vi^ho can. correct and change their corrupt 
bias, and give them a divine tendency. 
They are so ready to take a wrong turn, 
and sometimes to make wide mischief, even 
in the matters of religion, that God alone 
can keep them constant in their right situa- 
tion and course. They are living wheels 
of strong and powerful movement in human 
nature, but they make wretched work if 
they are not put in motion by a regular and 
happy spring. They are glorious and noble 
instruments of religion when under good 
conduct, but they are ungovernable and 
mischievous powers, when they go astray : 
and they are also too prone to wander from 
their proper place and duty. Let it, there- 
I fore, be the matter of our daily prayer, that 
' we may be " sanctified throughout in body, 
' soul and spirit," 1 Thess. v. 23. and that 
I every faculty of our nature may lend its 
j proper aid to the kingdom of grace within 
! us, till we are trained up by the piety of this 
r present state, and made fit for the unknow- 
, ing exercises of a sublimer sort of devotion 
in the kingdom of glory. 



166 DISCOURSE V. 



MEDITATION. 



What a wide and unhappy ruin has the 
fall of man spread over all the powers of 
the soul ! Oar understanding is darkened, 
our will grown perverse, and our passions 
corrupt and irregular in their exercises ; 
and even when they are engaged about the 
things of God, their conduct is not always 
wise and holy. We have seen what glo- 
rious instruments they are, when managed 
by the hands of divine grace, to promote 
piety and goodness : but if they are left to 
themselves, they will sometimes make wild \ 
mischief, even in the sacred concerns of re- 
ligion. 

Guard and secure me, O my God, against 
those false lights which my affections may 
cast upon the objects I converse with, and 
so delude my judgment. Suffer me not to 
be imposed on by the false colours, in which 
my passions may happen to dress up error, 
and make it look like truth. Let my judg- 
ment be always directed steadily by the 
reason of things and the discoveries of thy 
word, and not by the delusive flatteries of 
the passions. Let me remember that these 
were not given for my guides in the search 
of duty or truth; they were not made to 
teach me what is false and what is true, but 



DISCOURSE V. 167 

I to awaken me with the greater zeal to pur- 
sue truth, and to practise whatever I learn 
to be my duty. 

May I be so happy as always to lay solid 

reason and scripture for the foundation, 

I whence my devout affections may take their 

' rise, and ascend high toward God : let them 

never flutter in the dark, nor break away 

from the government of my understanding : 

that if at any time, my conscience calls me 

' to account for the warmest and boldest 

' flights of my pious affections, I may be able 

I to support and justify them all upon the foot 

of reason, and by the divine examples and 

encouragements of the word of God. 

If at any time, my zeal has been too fer- 
vent about the lesser matters of Christianity, 
while it has been cold and listless in the 
things of the highest importance^ I w^ould 
take shame to myself in the sight of God 
and men. Blessed Jesus, never suffer my 
anxieties, my fears, my desires, and my 
joys to rise, but in due proportion to the 
worth and importance of their objects. Let 
my name never be numbered among those 
men of irregular zeal, " who strain at a 
gnat, and swallow a camel," Matt, xxiii. 
i24. When I read or hear of the idolators 
tand bigots of the church of Rome, in what a 
^ strange childish manner, and with what ri- 
diculous fopperies they express their love, 



168 DISCOURSE V, 

to God and Christ, and to saints departed ; 
when I read how they scourge their bodies 
to show their sorrow for sin, and put their 
flesh to torments which God never appoint- 
ed nor required : when I have been told 
how they cut and burn and destroy their 
fellow-christians, animated by a supposed 
zeal for God and his church ; I bless God 
that I have been taught better methods of 
expressing my devout affections. " Come^ 
not, O my soul, into their secrets, to their 
assemblies be thou not united." Gen. xlix. 
5. Nor let my religion make me sour and 
unsociable ; nor let me indulge awkward 
gestures, or put on a distorted countenance, 
nor appear with any unmanly or unbecom- 
ing airs, to express the inward workings 
of my heart. I am afraid of all those out- 
ward forms which would turn piety into 
contempt before an ungodly world, who 
take all the^ occasions to ridicule things 
sacred. 

I would remember that religion does not 
consist in a warm flash of aflection, or in 
sudden eflbrts of devout joy, where holiness 
has no settled root in the heart, nor any vi- 
s^ible fruits in the conversation. Let me be 
all of a piece, and if my Christianity raises 
my pious passions in the church, or in the 
closet, may the same christian spirit be 
found in all my daily behaviour : may it 



DISCOURSE V. 169 

regulate my words and adorn my actions, 
that God, angels, and men> niay see the 
golden thread of religion running through 
my heart and life, in an uniform manner, 
in all times, places, and stations. 

Never let my devotions break in upon 
any part of other necessary duties which I 
owe to God or man : the great God does 
not permit sacrifice to stand in the room of 
works of mercy, nor will he allow of robbe- 
ry for burnt offering. Remember this, O 
my soul ! 

Help me, O my God, to keep up my 
pious affections to their own character, and 
let them not degenerate into a vicious or 
criminal temper of mind. Suffer not my 
zeal against error, to turn into fury against 
a mistaken brother. Teach me to piiy the 
man, while I endeavour to cure his unhap- 
py mistakes by the only methods which 
Christ has appointed, by gentle reasoning, 
by arguments drawn from scripture, by the 
winning arts of love and goodness, and by 
earnest prayer for his recovery from the er- 
ror of his way. Let me watch against ev- 
ery instance wherein holy affections may be 
corrupted and turned into vice or folly. 

Though I desire to have my passions 

I deeply tinctured by the things of God, yet 

I would not live entirely by the efforts of 

devout passion, nor judge of my state and 

S 



170 DISCOURSE V, 

frame merely by these sorts of emotion. It 
is possible that sudden flashes of affection 
may sometimes deceive our j^idgment, and 
make us determine suddenly and unjustly 
concerning ourselves and our state God- 
ward. Let my religion and love to God be 
deeply rooted in the mind, and in the prin- 
ciples of solid knowledge ; let my will be 
strongly and unchangeably inclined towards 
God and things heavenly : and let my love 
and hope, my desire, my sorrow, and my 
joy, be all awake and engaged in proper 
seasons, to promote the divine work within 
me, and make blessed advances daily to- 
ward the world of perfection. Amen. 



DISCOURSE VI, 



The affectionate Christiaii vindicated^ and 
the sincere soul comforted under his com- 
plaints of deadness^ ^^c. 

We have seen what are the various ad- 
vantages that may be derived from the exer- 
cise of the passions, in the concerns of re- 
ligion ? and we have taken notice of the ir- 
regularities to which they are liable, and 
have endeavoured to guard against the 
abuse of them. 

We proceed now to the fifth general head 
of discourse which Was proposed, and this 
is to vindicate the affectionate christian from 
the unjust reproaches of men, in his warm- 
est exercises of love to God and devotion. 
Surely one would think there appears suffi- 
cient reason for pious souls to indulge their 
most lively affections in worship, and that 
without any abuse of their reason, or abase- 
ment of their religion^ These inward sen- 
sations of holy delight, these secret joys 
which a stranger interrueddles not with, 



172 DISCOURSE VI. 

these experimental parts of godliness, may 
be set in a rational light, and be justified 
to the understanding of men. What is 
there in all this account of a christian's love 
to God, and the regulated exercise of pious 
passions, that is not agreeable to solid rea-. 
son, and to the natural notions that we have 
of God and our duty, as well as to the 
brighter discoveries we have by divine re- 
velation ? What is there in all these work- 
ings of a holy soul, but what is the just 
and proper result of the nature of man, as 
an inferior spirit in the present circumstan- 
ces of flesh and blood meditating on God 
the infinite and supreme Spirit, with a live- 
ly hope of his favour, and acceptance ? 

Will the deist and the infidel tell me, 
that " this is all mechanical religion, the 
mere effect of animal nature, the visionary 
scenes of fancy, and the boilings of a warm 
imagination ?" Will they laugh at all this 
account, and say, " there is nothing in it but 
the passionate ferment of flesh and blood, 
which we mistake for a reasonable religion 
and worship ?" I would enter the lists with 
them, even upon the foot of reason, and 
justify these sensations of experimental 
Christianity, by a few plain and gradual 
steps of argument. 

1. Is not the great God, the creator and 
supreme governor of all things ? Is he not 



DISCOURSE VI. . 173 

the most glorious and most excellent Spi- 
rit ? Is lie not a being of infiaite majesty, 
of holiness and of mercy ? Is he not a God 
of awful sovereignty, a wise ruler, and a 
righteous judge ? Is he not kind and com- 
passionate toward his humble and obedient 
creatures ? Is he not a fountain of eternal 
blessedness, and an all sufficient and ever- 
lasting good to those that seek and serve 
him : Is he not a God that hath terrors to 
vindicate his government, and to punish 
those that break -his law ? Is not this the 
God that the wiser and better sort of hea- 
thens acknowledged, and do acknowledge 
as well as the christians ? 

2, Is not the mind of man made capable 

in. some measure of knowing this God? 

And are we not bound to acquaint ourselves 

with him ? Is not man therefore bound to 

i get these notions and ideas of the attributes 

iof God, his maker, represented to his 

mind, in the truest, the fairest, and the 

, strongest light ? Or, are the faintest and 

I the feeblest notions of our Creator the 

best ? Are we not under an obligation 

i sometimes to recollect these ideas of God, 

when we come to converse humbly with 

him? Should we not endeavour to bring 

them fresh and strong into our memory, 

and to make his majesty and his mercy, as 

it were, present to our souls, by the full- 



174 DISCOURSE VI. ' I 

est and brightest conceptions we can form, 
when we come to worship before him, when 
we address him with prayer for any blessing 
that we want, or when we praise him for 
any mercies we have received from him? 

8. Ought not this knowledge, this holy 
remembrance of God, to influence the 
other powers of our nature ? Doth not con- 
science itself tell the deist, that his own 
sentiments of so glorious a being, demand 
his highest honour, and his humxblest wor- 
ship ? Do not his own thoughts require of 
him a behaviour agreeable to all those high 
conceptions which he hath of the perfec- 
tions of the divine nature? Are not our 
minds bound to think of him with the high- 
est esteem ? Are not our wills bound to re- 
solve upon obedience to this wise and holy 
governor, and to submit with patience to 
all his providences ? Are not our eyes made 
to contemplate his works, and ought we not 
to give him the honour of his wisdom and 
power, that formed this world of wonders 
which our eyes behold ? And are not our 
tongues obliged to speak honourably of him, 
and to render him a just revenue ofpi^ise? 
Is it not our duty to offer the tribute of our 
lips, in thankfulness for a thousand bless- 
ings we receive from his bounty and bene'* 
ficence ? 



DISCOURSE VI. - 175 

4. Are not our passions or affections a 
particular power of human nature that owes 
God some honour, as well as the under- 
standing and will, the eyes and the tongue? 
Were not these affectionate powers made to 
be excited by thought of the mind, and to be 
exercised agreeably to the judgment and 
conscience? Or are the passions the only 
powers of our nature that owe no homage 
to the God that made them, and must not be 
employed in his service ? 

Many of the affections are pleasing to na- 
ture in their various exercises, and can they 
not have leave to be employed in piety ? 
Must religion be made so dry and tasteless 
and melancholy a thing as to forbid all plea- 
sure ? Have we not permission to love God, 
the most amiable spirit, whose perfections 
and glories surpass all created things ? Must 
we never take delight in God, the author 
of OUT nature, and the source of eternal 
blessedness? Is religion the only thing 
whence all pleasing affection must be for 
ever banished and excluded ? And must I 
withhold all these pleasant and powerful 
sensations of nature from intermingling 
with the things of God ? Hath my wise and 
merciful Creator given mc such a faculty as 
admiration, and may I admire the heavens 
and the earth, the fishes, the blasts, and 
the birds, and not admire that all-wise and 



I 



176 DISCOURSE VI. 

almighty being that made me and them ? 
May I lay out my wonder on any thing, or 
on every thing besides the great God, who 
created all these wonders ? Hath he formed 
my soul to delight and love, and hath he 
confined these sweet and pleasurable capa- 
cities only to be employed about creatures, 
when the Creator himself is infinite and su- 
preme in loveliness ? Will not this most 
amiable of beings expect that I should love 
himself, and. give me leave to make him 
my delight ? Is it lawful for me to fear a 
lion or an adder, a whirlwind or a flash of 
lightning, and may I not indulge a holy and 
solemn dread of that glorious being that 
made lightnings and whirlwinds, adders 
and lions, and has unknown thunders in re- 
serve for profane sinners ? Doth he give me 
leave to mourn and weep for the loss of my 
ease, or my health, or my friends, and may 
I never indulge my sorrow to arise for all 
my multiplied ofl^ences against his law, my 
former rebellions against his government, 
and my refusals of his grace ? 

Thus far I have begged leave for the pas- 
sions to assist religion, and I think reason 
gives an ample permission. But I may 
rise to bolder language here, and pronounce 
my argument with stronger force, if I 
should resume the first part of this head of 
reasoniDg, and make all these inquiries 



DISCOURSE VI. 177 

turn upon the point of obligation and duty.. 
Since I know this God to be infinite in good- 
ness, and the author of all my comforts, am 
I not bound to love him with all my strength, 
and with all my soul? If he is a being of 
sovereign power, holiness, and justice, ought 
I not always to fear before him, and to grieve 
heartily that I have offended against his 
holy laws ? Is it not my duty to mourn for 
sin, and to be ashamed of my unnatural 
and unreasonable conduct? And doth not 
God require, that I should rejoice before 
him with thankfulness, when I have some 
hope that he hath accepted my submission, 
pardoned my sin, and holds me in his favour 
and love ? 

•But let me proceed yet further in this 
argument, and say, have not my passions 
themselves been too often engaged in folly 
and sin ? And must they do nothing for the 
interests of religion and virtue ? Hath not 
the great and blessed God been affronted 
and dishonoured by these warm and active 
powers of my nature ? And may not he 
make some reprisals on them by leading 
them captive by his grace, and devoting 
them to his own service? Must the pas-- 
sions, which have been defiled with ^so 
much iniquity, and which have helped to 
defile the soul^ never be refined ? Never be 
sanctified ? Never attempt to restore that 



178 DISCOURSE VI. 






tribute of honour and obedience to the 
great God, of which they have long de- 
frauded him ? Have I loved vanity ? Have 
I delighted in sin ? Has my desire, my 
hope, my joy, been heretofore employed 
on criminal objects ? And must these af-. 
fections of desire and hope, of love and de- 
light, be forbid to pursue objects divine and 
heavenly, and be for ever excluded from all 
pious employment ? Have I grieved for the 
loss of a sinful pleasure, or been angry with 
my brother, and hated him without a cause ? 
And ought T not to turn the stream of my 
wjpth and hatred against my sins, and to 
give a loose to the passion of grief, and 
pious sorrow, for my guilty behaviour to- 
ward God and man ? Are these faculties of 
my nature capable of sinning only, and in- 
capable of practising virtue and goodness? 
Or is it not lawful to attempt to employ them 
in the service of religion ? 

Let the deists, and the men of cold phi- 
losophy tell me, that virtue and piety, and 
goodness, consist only in sublime ideas X)f 
God, and in a will devoted to him : and that 
it is only the pure affections of the mind or 
spirit, that are to be exercised tow^ard God 
and religion; but the motions of flesh and 
blood must have nothing to do here, nor 
passions of the animal have any part or 
share in the religion of the man. 



DISCOURSE VT. 179 

To such objectors I would reply thus : 
5. Is it possible that the purest affections 
can be exerted in any vigorous efforts in 
our present state of mortality, but flesh 
and blood will feel and follow them a little ? 
Can these sublime ideas of the blessed God, 
and these pure and spiritual affections be 
raised to a high degree, but the powers 
and passions of animal nature will be suit- 
ably touched and moved, at least in some 
'degrees, according to the natural temper? 
All persons are not equally capable of warm 
-affection, and vigorous ferments of blood : 
But there is not a son or daughter of Adam, 
without some degree of these natural emo- 
. lions. They have been felt by wise and 
holy meii, that have lived in all ages of the 
world; and it must be so, in some mea- 
sure, while we are such a composition of 
flesh and spirit. - 

I grant, indeed, that some such cold an4 
indifferent worshippers as can make this ob- 
jection, whose religion consists only in a 
philosophical thought of the great God, 
and a devout wish perhaps once in a week 
or two, may not feel any of these sensible 
effects in anim.al nature. Those also may 
be excepted who^are brought up in a mere 
round of forms, and never say their prayers, 
but at the sound of a bell, and a public 
hour ; I except all those papist' devo- 



180 DISCOURSE VI. 

tees, who mutter over their Latin service, 
" their pater-nosters'^ and " ave maria's'* 
by tale, and drop their beads, to count their 
prayers right, and to secure themselves 
from mistaking the number. All these 
sorts of worshippers may join in the same 
opinion, and renounce their affections in 
their rjeligion ; and that for this reason, be- 
cause they have not religion enough to em- 
ploy them. But where a constant and su- 
preme love to God is the real spring that 
moves us to our duties, the rest of the na- 
tural passions will have some correspondent 
share in the work. And it is a very false 
way of judging, for these kinds of people, 
to compare all men with themselves, and 
make their cold indifference and their lazy 
practice the standing model of the religion 
of all mankind. 

Let us suppose for once, that we were 
confined to the mere religion of nature : 
hath it not -been sufficiently proved, that 
reason and the light of nature provide for 
the passions some share of employment, 
even in natural religion? And it is to be 
feared, that it is not merely the unbelief of 
Christianity, but the want of serious inward 
religion of any kind, that inclines the infi- 
dels of our age to oppose and ridicule the 
exercise of devout affections. Is not the 
book of Psdimsr a nobleuand sublime collec- 



DISCOURSE VI. 181 

tion of lyric poesy ? Are not several parts 
of these sacred odes confined to such no- 
tions and* practices in religion, as the light 
of nature and reason dictates ? Now if these 
persons had true piety at heart, one would 
think they should rejoice in these sprightly 
and pious composures, and use them as a 
help to raise their souls to God their Crea- 
tor, in love and praise. Will they make 
this excuse, that the language is too warm, 
too much animated and pathetic ; that there 
is too much of the beauty of metaphor; 
too many bright images that strike power- 
fully upon the passions ; whereas the reli- 
gion of nature, in their opinion, is a more 
calm and sedate thing? Surely it is much 
to be feared and suspected, that their pray- 
ers and their praises, and all their preten- 
ces to piety, will go but a little way to raise 
their souls to heaven, when their modes of 
worship cannot bear the language of such 
devout affections, and admit of no eleva- 
tions above calm ideas and sedate indo- 
lence. 

But I return to my vindication of the 
iaffectionate christian, in his warmest ex- 
^ ercises of devout passion. 

I might proceed much farther on thi^ 
point, and say, when the affections are im- 
pressed and awakened to a powerful exer- 
jcise, by divine truths, will not these lively 



182 DISCOURSE Vi. 

powers have a farther and a reflexive influ- 
ence on the mind and the will ? Do the^ 
not sensibly impress the ideas of divine 
things with much stronger force on the 
mind ? Do they not set all the affairs of re- 
ligion in a more lovely and attractive light ? 
Do they not confirm the will in all its holy 
resolutions for God and heaven ? Have they 
not often been found to stamp divine things 
on the memor}^ and conscience with more 
lasting efficacy ? Do not the devout pas- 
sions awaken the latent images of fancy, 
and dress all the chambers of the soul, with 
divine ideas and ornaments ? And have 
they not by this means assisted the soul to 
maintain its constant converse with hea- 
ven ? Is it not in the power of the sacred 
passions to raise and brighten the language 
of the tongue, as well as command the 
tears of the eye lids, and the smiles of the 
countenance ? Are not our hope and our 
fear given us to be living spurs to duty, 
and wakeful guards against temptation and 
disobedience; and do they not often em- 
ploy the hands and the feet, direct the eyes, 
and awaken the voice ? Will not holy love 
and joy give a lively and pleasing motion 
to the blood and spirits ? And the hope of 
having sin forgiven, and our souls made 
for ever happy, excite a thousand pleasures 
in human nature ? Will it not fill the soul 



DISCOURSE TI. 183 

with overflowings of gratitude, and make 
the lips abound in expressions of joy and 
praise ? And will not these be attended 
with a peaceful and pleasing aspect, and 
establish a sweet serenity in the heart and 
eyes ? And all concur to maintain religion 
in the power and the joy of it ? 

Christians, be not afraid of professing 
the pleasures of religion. These men of 
pretended reason, are vanquished at their 
own weapons, w'hen they dare deride your 
converse with God, and fight against the 
inward power of your devotions. Be ye 
convinced therefore, and be established in 
this truth, that it is not the Avarmest exer- 
cise of our affections, that can be ridicu- 
lous in religion, Avhen they are excited by 
a just apprehension of divine things : But 
then it is the passions are justly censured 
when they are indulged to raptures in the 
confusion and darkness of the mind; when 
they flutter and make a tumult in the twi- 
' light of the understanding, or when they 
are raised high by mere enthusiasm and 
the visions of fancy, without the solid 
foundation of knowledge and judgment to 
support them ; as I have shown in a fore- 
going discourse. 

Give diligence therefore, O my friends 
to improve in the knowledge of God the 
Father, and in the gospel of our Lord Je- 



184 DISCOURSE VI. 

sus Christ ! Maintain your humble con- 
verse with heaven, labour and strive in me- 
ditation and prayer till you get near the 
seat of God, and find sweet acitess to his 
tirone through the blood of Christ, and 
the aids of the blessed Spirit : Awaken all 
the springs of holy love and divine joy. 
These sacred pleasures will animate you 
to every duty ; will be a guard to your souls 
against temptation, and give you courage 
to stand the ridicule of an unbelieving age^- 
these divine refreshments, like the heaven- 
ly manna, will support your spirits through 
all the wilderness, and make your travels 
easy and delightful : these will lead you on 
with joy to the promised land, and prepare 
you to dwell for ever with that God, with 
whom you have here enjoyed so long and 
blessed a correspondence. 

We proceed now to the sixth general. 

Since it appears to be a matter of such 
importance to have the affections engaged 
in the affairs of religion, some humble and 
sincere souls may be ready to pronounce 
hard things concerning themselves, and 
conclude they have no true religion, be- 
cause they feel their affections but little 
moved : We proposed therefore, that 

The sixth general head of discourse 
should offer " some consolations to such 
honest and humble christians, who endea- 



DISCOURSE VI. 185 

vour to love and serve the Lord their God 
with all their powers, but find very little of 
this exercise of the pious passions in com- 
parison with what others feel." Let me 
address such persons as these in the follow- 
ing- manner. 

L Since you doubt whether you love 
God v/ith all your heart, that is, with your 
warmest affections, " search and inquire 
with holy fear, and with the greater dili- 
gence, whether you love him with all your 
mind, with all your soul, and with all your 
strength." Do you love him with all your 
mind? Have 3^ou the highest esteem of 
him in your judgm-enl, as the most excel- 
lent and best of beings, and as your only 
sufficient good ? Do you love him with all 
your soul ? Have you chosen him for your 
eternal portion, both in this world and that 
-which is to come ? Is your will firmly resol- 
ved for God and religion? Are you sin- 
cerely willing to forsake every sin, and to 
return to God ; to give up yourself to him 
as your Lord and ruler, and receive him 
as your God and reconciled Father, ac- 
cording to the discoveries of his grace iu 
Christ Jesus ? Do you love him with all 
your strength ? Do you desire to obey and 
serve him all yoi* days ? Do you worship 
him with holy diligence and prom.ote his 
8=^ 



186 DISCOURSE VI. 

honour in the world, according to the ut- 
most of your capacity. 

If you find these things wrought in you. 
and done by you, you have abundant rea- 
son to take comfort in this evidence of 
your Christianity. Where the mind and 
will are sincerely engaged on the side of | 
God and religion in this manner, the love 
of the heart is not utterly wanting ; the af- 
fections must be in some measure sancti-^ 
fied, though perhaps you may not feel soj 
frequent, so powerful, and so lively an ex- 
ercise of them as other christians may en- 
joy. These things are a better proof oi 
true faith and real piety than a sudden flash: 
of affection can be, where these more stea-| 
dy operations of the mind and will are] 
wanting. 

II. Though all the sons and daughters 
of Adam have some degrees of passion in 
their very frame and nature, yet remember 
that the temper of all men is not equally 
affectionate. Consider now and inquire, 
whether your temper has so much of these 
affectiotiate principles wrought in it, as 
some of your neighbours may possess : 
There are some of a much calmer and 
more sedate constitution ; their passions of 
desire and joy, of fear apd hope, of sor- 
row and anger, are seldom moved about 
earthly things ; and then it is no wonder 



DISCOURSE VI. 187 

that they are not so sensibly impressed with 
things heavenly. God requires no more 
than he gives ; where he has wrought these 
pathetic principles in the constitution, he 
requires the exercise of them, in the things 
of religion : but where persons are of a 
more dispassionate and a calmer frame, 
there God will require less of the sensible 
exercises of affection in the christian life, 
2 Cor. viii. 12. " If there be a willing 
mind, it is accepted according to what a 
man has, and not according to what he has 
not." 

I confess, if you have warm and lively 
passions for all other things, and none at 
all for God and religion, and heavenly ob- 
jects ; if your fear, joy, sorrow, and de- 
sire, are vigorous in their emotions, and 
are immediately raised by the affairs and 
occurrences of this life, and yet lie always 
asleep with regard to divine things, it is a 
very bad sign indeed, and has a very unfa- 
vourable aspect on the case of your soul : 
For " where much is given, much shall be 
required," Luke xiv. 48. 

III. " Consider what is your present 
stage of life : are jSu in the flower of 
youth, when all the powers of nature are 
active, when the"^ passions are warm and 
lively ? Or are you in the decay of nature^ 
and on the verge of life ? Is old age coitiiiifg 



188 DISCOURSE VI. 

1 

upon you, or is it already come, when the 
animal powers are weakened, when the 
operations of flesh and blood are more lan^ 
guid." An old man cannot have those live- 
ly passions and appetites with regard to 
sensible things, as belong to the years of 
youth and the vigour of nature. Old Bar- 
"zillai could not feel his desires awakened 
and tempted to dwell at court, by all the 
dishes of a royal table, or the sprightly! 
music, or the rich entertainments thereJ 
2 Sam. xix. 35. And therefore it is nc? 
v/onder if the devout passions be then more 
languid and unmoved. An aged christian 
may have the most fixed resolution for God, 
and the firmest principles of piety rooted 
in his soul; he may do much service for 
God, and in this sense " may flourish and 
bring forth fruit in old age," Psalm xcii. 
14. he may have great advancements in real 
godliness, though there may be few such 
sensible evidences of it, given to himself 
or to his neighbours, in the lively motion 
of his pathetic powers. 

But on the other hand, it is a very sad 
and melancholy symptom, if the evil pas- 
sions of covetousntfis, of anger, of re- 
venge, of envy, reign and exert themselves 
with violence in old age^ while there is lit- 
tle or nothing of warm affection exercised 
in the things of religion. 



DISCOURSE VI. 



189 



IV. " Let humble and sincere christians 
remember also, for their encouragement, 
that though spiritual things may be the 
chief object of our hope and desire, yet 
our passions may not always be so power- 
fully impressed by them as they are by sen- 
sible and carnal things ; and the reason is 
because they are spiritual and invisible. 

The passions which are wrought into our 
present frame, belong partly to animal na- 
ture, as well as to the mind ; and therefore, 
the things of sense are nearer a-kin to 
them : they touch and strike our passions 
sooner, and awaken them to more vivacity, 
and engage them w^ith more vehemence 
than things which are unseen. The pas- 
sions are certain principles in man which 
depend much on flesh and blood ; and there- 
fore, they are more naturally impressed by 
things that strike our eyes and our ears, 
and by them find a way to their hearts. It 
is possible that God and heaven may Be 
really more beloved than men and this 
earth, though the animal powers of joy, 
hope, fear, and desire, may not be so sen- 
sible and vehement in their operations to- 
ward spiritual, ab§eat and futufe ol5jects, 
as toward things present'*^^and . sensible. 
There is not therefore sufficient ground to 
conclude that we do not love Goi above 
the creatures, because we sometimes feel 



190 DISCOURSE VI. 

the more passionate exercises and commo- 
tions of flesh and blood about creatures, 
than we do about God himself: and indeed^ 
were.it not for this reasonable salve, this 
spring of consolation, a multitude of chris- 
tians would be ready to give themselves up 
to despair : and I doubt there would be ve- 
ry few of us who would not have reason to 
suspect the truth and power of our inward 
religion. 

Yet I cannot conclude without this ob- 
servation. 

In the last place, that "what comfort- 
able evidences soever of our love to God 
may be derived from the high esteem of 
him in our minds, and the attachment of 
our wills to him, yet these evidences and 
comforts will be greatly brightened and in- 
creased by feeling the affectionate love of 
God in the heart." To love the Lord our 
God, with all the mind, and with all the 
soul, and with all the strength, becomes 
more glorious when it influences the affec- 
tionate powers of the heart to join in the 
practice of religion. 

It is granted that ihe mere flashes of sud- 
den passion m a devouPinoment, without a 
settled siipr«me esteem of God in the mind, 
without a firm attachment of the will to 
him^ and careful obedience to his com- 
mands, will yield, but small and feeble con- 



DISCOURSE VI. 191 

solation in a time of trial and inqtiiry : the 
hearers who " received the word like seed 
in stony ground, are said to receive it with 
joy," but their religion was but a flash; it 
*' endured but for a short season. It sprung 
up on a sudden and quickly withered, be- 
cause it had no root" in the understanding 
and the will. Matt. xiii. 20, 21. Yet it is 
better, infinitely better to find and feel that 
we love God with all our powers : we should 
therefore use all proper methods to stir up 
our drowsy affections, and engage them in 
divine things, that we may live in the plea- 
\ sure of godliness as well as in the power 
j of it, and have our hopes rising high aiui 
1 approaching to the joys of heaven, while 
we dwell here on earth. What these pro- 
j per methods are, whereby the devout pas- 
1 sions may be raised, will be the subject of 
I our next inquiry. 



MEDITATION. 



I It is strange that any person should cavil 

fcagainst the exercise of the warmest at 

|rections of man in the things that relate to 

;he great God and 'in matters of oCrr* im- 

-nortal interest. It is strange to hear any 

i^liisputfe arise against the engagement of our 



192 DISCOURSE VI. 

strongest and most sprightly powers in the 
service of the best of beings, and our eter- 
nal friend. O may I know him, and love 
him, and fear him, and delight in him, as 
becomes a creature to fear and to love a 
God, that is, in a supreme degree. In 
vain shall the world assault me with their 
keenest reproaches, in vain shall a banter- 
ing and godless age attempt to laugh me 
out of countenance for indulging the divine 
sensations of religion. Let them tell me, 
" It is mere animal nature and the caprices 
of flesh and blood," let them charge me 
with enthusiastical folly and feverish heats 
of religion, I dare pronounce boldly in the 
face of ridicule and scandal, that the prit- 
dent aflectionate christian, in his devoutest 
hours does nothing beneath the dignity of 
reason, nor unbecoming the character of 
the wisest of men. I have David and the 
prophets, I have Christ and his apostles en- 
gaged on this side of the question by their 
own practice, and I shall count it my hon- 
our to be a humble imitator of such blessed 
patterns. 

O may I find the secret pys of religious 
ri^tirement, joys which a stranger intermed- 
dles.iipjk with! May Ijfeel some pious af- 
fection animating me to all the duties of 
the christian life ! May I see myself jising 
high above -earthly things, with holy con- 



DISCOURSE VI. 193 

tempt mounting, as on eagle's wings, to- 
ward heaven; and then I shall not be fright- 
ed nor discouraged at all the arrows of re- 
proach that are shot against* me. The af- 
fectionate christian has much more reason 
on his side than all those indolent worship- 
pers, those dry and joyless creatures, those 
cold pretenders to religion, who have re- 
nounced their affections in the things of 
God, and creep on at a low and grovelling 
rate, feeding only on some natural truths 
and speculations without life, power, or 
pleasure. 

But if I find my natural temper has very 
little of the pathetic composition in it, and 
that my affections by nature are not so 
vigorous as those of my neighbour; If I 
feel the more vehement efforts of love and 
fear of holy sorrow, and pious pleasure 
sink; and decline, through the decay of na- 
ture or growing age, I will comfort myself 
with this, that it is the desire of my soul 
to have all its powers and passions engaged 
for God in their most vital • and active 
exercises. 

If at any time I am so "linhappy as to 
feel my affections exert themselves, in^a 
more vigorous manner towards the objects 
of flesh and sense which are "present, than 
they, do toward things absent, divine ar^d 
heavenly, I would mourn over the frailty 

9 



194 DISCOURSE VI. 

of human nature in this present state, where 
we are so much attached to the things of 
this body. I will endeavour through di- 
vine grace " to love the Lord my God with 
all my mind, and with all my soul," to 
raise him higher in the esteem of my judg- 
ment, to cleave to him more firmly by 
resolute bent of my will, to abide dail; 
with him, and live upon him, as my all' 
sufficient and everlasting good, that I ma; 
attain some comfortable establishment ii 
the hope of his love : and when my flesh 
and heart and all my animal powers shall- 
fail me, I may still rejoice in having God 
for my God, who will be the strength of 
my heart, and the life of my spirit, and my 
portion for ever." Psalm Ixxiii. 26. Amen. 



DISCOURSE VII. 



Means of exciting the devout Affections. 

We are now come to the last thing de« 
signed in these discourses, and that is to 
propose a ^' few proper methods, whereby 
the affections of nature may be awakened 
and employed in the christian life." Take 
Ihem in the following order. 

I. See to it that the leading and ruling 
faculties of the soul, viz. the understand- 
ing and the Avill, be deeply and firmly en- 
gaged in religion. Let the mind be yvell 
furnished with divine knowledge, and the 
will be as resolutely bent for God and 
heaven. 

Where the understanding has but a poor 
and scanty furniture of the things of God, 
the pious affections w^ll have the fewer 
springs to raise them : and if our ideas of 
divine thinofs are obscure und confused, 
our passions' are in great danger of running 
wildly astray, and of being led away by 
every delusion. Seek therefore not only a 



196 DISCOURSE VII. 

large and plenteous acquaintance with th6 
things of God, but endeavour, as far as 
possible, to get clear and distinct concep- 
tions of them, that the pious passions may 
have solid ground whence to take their rise. 
And then let your will be steadily se4 
for God without weakness or wavering. If 
the resolves and purposes of the heart be 
feeble and doubtful, the affections will never* 
rise to any high degree in a regular or last-f 
ing manner. 

But I have said so much on these points 
that I shall not enlarsfe here. If the mind and 
will are sanctified, it is certain, according 
to the very frame of our natures, that the 
passions will in some degree follow the in- 
fluence of these governing faculties. Why 
is it our passions are suddenly alarmed and 
so warmly influenced by the things of this 
world ? It is because our minds have too 
high a value for them, our wills are too 
much attached to them, we place our hap- 
piness too much in them. Matt. vi. 21. 
" Where the treasure is, the heart will 
be also :" The heart with all its passions. 
Why are our desires, our longings, our 
fears, and hopes, our sorrows, joys, and 
resentments so keen, and so intense about 
the things of life ? It is because these things 
are too much esteemed as our treasure, our 
portion, our inheritance. If Go4 be our 



DISCOURSE vn. 197 

portion, Christ our life, and heaven our 
inheritance and our home, then our " af- 
fections will be set on the things that are 
above, where Christ is at the right hand of 
God," Col. iii. 1, 2. 

II. Engage the most powerful and go- 
verning passion for God, that is, the pas- 
sion of love : all the train of affections will 
obey its ruling power and influence, they 
will all follow its motions and sovereign 
dictates, as was made evident in the second 
discourse on this subject. And we have 
shown you before, that in order to excite 
divine love in our hearts, w^e must medi- 
tate frequently on these things, viz : w^hat 
the great and blessed God is in himself, 
w^hat he has done for us, what he daily 
does for us, and what he has promised to 
do, both in this life and the life to come. 
• Never be easy or at rest, therefore, if 
you find your love to God, flag and lan- 
guish ; fcrr then the other affections will 
grow cold and lifeless in religion* Take 
all opportunities to warm your heart with 
this sacred passion, and to rekindle the fire 
of divine love within you, when at any 
time you find it declining. 

^ III. " Watch carefully against the too 
strong attachment of your affections to 
creatures :" Eemember that tliis world is 
2^t enmity M^ith God, James iv. 4. " If any 



198 DISCOURSE VII. 

man love the world, the love of the Father 
is not in him," 1 John ii. 15. Where the 
love of the world is habitually prevalent, the 
love of God is not found; for God is the 
supreme good, and the most lovely of be- 
ings, and he counts that love as nothing 
which is not supreme. " No man can 
serve two masters. You cannot serve God 
and mammon," Matt. vi. 25. That is, the 
true God, and the god of riches: and we 
may say by the same rule, you cannot love 
the true God, and the god of honour and 
ambition, or the god of sensuality and car- 
nal pleasure. A God carries a supreme 
idea, and demands all the soul. 

Not only unlawful objects, and sinful 
pleasures, but even sensible delights, pos- 
sessions, and enjoyments, which are lawful, 
take too fast hold on the heart, and draw it 
away from God. Remember that the crea- 
tures around you have this advantage, that 
while God is a spirit, an unseen being, the 
creatures are ever striking upon our eyes or 
ears ; they are ever making their court to 
our senses and appetites, and have a thou- 
sand vrays to insinuate themselves into the 
heart. The world, and the flattering en- 
joyments of it, are suited to work upon 
flesh and blood, and to draw ofl" the soul 
from God, its centre and its rest : they are 
^ver near at hand on all occasions, and they 



DISCOURSE VII. 199 

are ready sometimes to say, " Where is 
your God ?" Keep your God therefore al- 
ways near you, and watch against the pleas- 
ing flattery of alluring creatures, lest your 
heart cleave too fast to them, and be there- 
by divided from your God. 

Amidst all the endearing relations and 
engaging businesses of life, single your- 
selves, as much as possible for God, and let 
not many things dwell too near your soul, 
lest you lose the sight of your heavenly Fa- 
ther, and the pleasing sensations of his love. 
Where the love of sensible things prevails, 
it draws with it all the long train of hopes 
and fears, of desires, joys, and sorrows ; of 
painful heart-aches, and fond wishes, and 
keen resentments. Thus the affectionate 
powers of nature are carnalized, and tinc- 
tured deep with the things of earth, and 
become too much estranged from God and 
heaven. 

Whensoever you find a tempting creature 
taking too fast hold of your passions, set a 
guard of sacred jealousy upon it; keep your 
heart at a holy distance from that creature, 
lest it twine about your inmost powers, and 
draw them off from their allegiance and du- 
ty to God your Creator. The love of God 
is a flower of divine original, and ©f ti^e 
growth of paradise: if the holy Spirit has 
planted it in your heart, let not any other 



200 DISCOURSE vn. 

love be planted too near it, nor too much 
nourished, lest it draw away the vital mois- 
ture, and cause the love of God to languish 
and wither. "• 

IV. Be not slight and careless in secret 
religion. Let private devotion, reading, 
meditation, prayer, have a proper share of- ' 
your time allotted them. In pious retire- ' 
ments you may indulge all the holy pas^ I 
sions with much greater freedom : you may 
there give a loose to all the devout affec- 
tions of the soul in their warmest exercises 
and expressions : you may say a thousand 
things to God in secret, which are not pro- 
per for public worship : you may pour out 
your souls before him in the strongest and 
most pathetic sentiments of holy desire and^ 
divine joy! You may tell him all the in* J 
ward pains of your conscience, the secret 
anguish and shame of your heart, because 
of your past offences : you may sigh deep- 
ly, and blush before him, and dissolve your 
eyes into tears : you may tell him in secret 
how intense your desires are to taste and 
be assured of his love, and to be formxed af- 
ter his image : you may rejoice in his sight 
with pious exultation and triumph, in hope 
of his eternal presence in the upper world. 
Soch'exe/cises as these will keep all .the 
passions in an habitual practice of religion, 



DISCOURSE VII. 201 

and maintain inward piety in the life and 
power of it. 

V. Converse much with those parts of 
our holy religion, and with those books of 
scripture which are suited to awaken your 
warmest affections. 

Let your thoughts take occasion from 
the various occurrences in nature and pro- 
vidence, to meditate on the glorious per- 
fections of God, the w^onders of his wis- 
dom in contriving the several parts of the 
creation, so happily fitted to answer his 
great designs. Think on his amazing 
powder, that could form all things by his 
word, and bring a whole Avorld into being 
at his will. Awaken your souls to admire 
the wide-spreading influence of his sove- 
reignty and government, who manages the 
immense affairs of the upper and the lower 
'worlds, the nations of men and the armies 
of angels : and yet extends his care to every 
one of us in particular, and even to the 
meaner figures of flies and worms. Think ^^ 
on the infinite extent of his knowledge, that 
he is acquainted not only with every crea- 
ture he has made, but with every thought 
that passes through our hearts, with all our 
most secret actions and purpoifes. This 
will awaken in you a holy fear of his ma- 
jesty, and you will dread the thoughts i;;if 
sinning against him, since it never can be 



202 DISCOURSE VII. 

concealed from his notice ; and while you 
think on his omnipresence, you may rejoice 
in him as your guardian and defence, 
through all times and places where or 
whensoever it is possible for danger to at- 
tend you. Meditate on his boundless good- 
ness : our God is love, and all nature is 
filled with the blessings of his bounty. He 
has overspread the skies with light, and co- 
vered the earth with food for man and 
beast. Of what a vast and surprizing ex- 
tent is the whole family of creatures which 
are maintained out of the stores of God ! 
What a transcendent veneration should we 
have of that goodness, which satisfies the 
craving appetites of millions daily and* 
hourly! T 

Besides these general effects of the di- 
vine goodness, it is proper to have the me- 
mory furnished with particular instances of 
protections, deliverances, escapes from dan- 
gers, rich and unmerited blessings, which 
we ourselves have enjoyed, that we may 
awaken our gratitude, re-kindle our dying 
love, and exalt our hearts and our voices in 
praise. 

Nor is it less useful to meditate some- 
times on the^sins and follies of mankind, 
that we may admire the patience of a God 
so affronted and so abused : nor is it less 
needful to recollect our own follies, and our 



DISCOURSE VII. 203 

guilt, that we may keep holy repentance in 
its lively exercises ; for the spring of godly 
sorrow should never be dried up while we 
dwell in these regions of sin and defilement. 

Then the astonishing designs of divine 
mercy towards guilty creatures, call for a 
due share of our meditations : designs of 
mercy in the heart of God, counsels of 
. peace transacted with his Son Jesus Christ 
before the world began, in order to rescue 
mankind from the ruins of nature, and to 
raise up a chosen seed for his own glory 
out of the rebellious race of Adam. 

Here the thoughts of a christian should 
spread themselves abroad, and give a loose 
to holy contemplation and wonder. Let us 
run back to ancient ages, and view Jesus 
the Son of God, '' the brightness of his Fa- 
ther's glory, in his pre-existent state of light 
and happiness, before he visited us in flesh," 
Heb. i. 3. There he dwelt in the bosom 
of the Father, before he made our world, or 
appeared in it : we should trace his various 
appearances to the patriarchs, and his con- 
duct of the church through many ages, un- 
der the name of the angel of God's pre- 
sence, under the character of the king of 
Israel : we should meditate on his wonder- 
ous condescensions to become incarnate, to 
dwell in such feeble flesh and blood as ours 
is, to be compassed about with infirmities. 



204 DISCOURSE VII. 

to sustain perpetual labours and sorrows, 
fatigues and reproaches, through the course 
of a mortal life ; to bear those unknown ago- : 
nies in the garden, and on the cross, which 
were the price of our pardon, and the means 
of his atonement for our guilt. What amaz- 
ing love is this ! How divine ! How un- 
searchable ! " It has heights, and lengths, 
and breadths, and depths in it, that pass all 
our knowledge," Eph. iii. 18, 19. and de- 
mand our devoutest praises. Trace him 
then from the cross to the tomb, follow him 
through the regions of the dead, behold 
him in the power and glory of his resurrec- 
tion ; see him ascending on a bright cloud., 
to heaven, attended *' with the chariots af 
God, which are twenty thousand, even un- 
numbered thousands of angels;" -Psalm 
Ixviii. 18. viewing him sitting on the right 
hand of God, making intercession there for 
sinners, rebels, enemies, that they may be 
divinely transformed into saints, children, 
friends. Survey him at the head of all 
principalities and powders, ruling all things 
according to his Father's decrees, for the 
glory of his Father, and for his own glory, 
as well as for the eternal welfare of his 
church. What bright and vigorous contem- 
plations, what entertaining ideas, what ef- 
forts of pious passion may be i^aised by a 



DISCOURSE VII. 206 

sanctified mind travelling such a spacious 
round of divine wonders ! 

Enter into yourselves, think what once 
you were, corrupt, abominable, unclean, un- 
holy : Remember the distinguishing grace 
of God, whereby you were awakened to a 
sense of your sin and danger, and were 
taught to fly for refuge to Jesus, your all- 
sufficient hope : think on your iniquities all 
pardoned ; think of your garments and soul 
washed white in the blood of the Lamb : 
think on the powerful influences of the Spi- 
,rit, that hath changed your vile nature, and 
-jhade it holy, that has guarded you from a 
thousand temptations, and is training you 
up to everlasting blessedness. Which of 
the passions is there, that would lie cold 
and silent, under the lively sentiments of 
such a various and important scene of 
things ? 

But I proceed to "the second part of this 
fifth direction ; and that is, " we may have 
our devout passions quickened by converse 
with those parts of the holy Bible which 
contain the most affecting subjects, and ex- 
press them in the most pathetic manner." 
JRead some of the wonders of mercy and 
love, in the transactions of God with his 
ancient people, how he rescued ^hemfrom 
the midst of barbarous nations and hostile 
armies ; how he brought them out of bond- 



206 DISCOURSE vn. 

age and brick-kilns, by a mighty and mira- 
culous effort of power and grace ; how he^ 
led them through seas dry-shod, and com- 
manded rivers to cleave-asunder, and leave 
a path for their march ; how he visited them 
after by missionary angels, and sometime^ 
in his own royal person ; for they saw the 
God of Israel, Exod. xxiv. 20. Read and 
meditate on the vengeance, and the terrible 
destruction executed on the old world that 
was drowned in the flood ; the deluge of 
wrath that fell on Sodom and Gomorrah, 
which perished by divine lightning; for 
"the Lord rained down fire and brimstone 
from the Lord out of heaven upon them," 
Gen. xix. 24. Read the ten plagues of 
Egypt, and the desolations that were some- 
times -spread over rebellious Israel, and 
sometimes over the heathen nations, by an 
angry God, in the writings of Moses, and 
the book of Judges. Read the soft aiad 
melting language of divine mercy, inviting 
sinners to return to God by Isaiah, the 
evangelic prophet. Survey the promises 
that are big with blessings, that contain 
pardon^ and righteousness, and grace, and 
life, and salvation, and glory in them; and 
let the pious affections of hope and love 
break out and diffuse themselves with sweet 
delight. Read the history of the life and 
death of our blessed Lord, which is made 



DISCOURSE VII. 207 

up of love and wonders, and look into some 
of the more affectionate paragraphs of St. 
Paul, and the pathetic parts of all the sacred 
epistles. 

But above all, for this purpose, I must 
recommend the specimens of divine medi- 
tation, and divine Vv^orship, the complaints, 
the supplications, and the songs of praise 
which are offered to God by holy men in 
the Old Testament and in the New. You 
find some of these in the books of Moses, 
Ezra, Job, Daniel, and other prophets ; es- 
pecially the Psalms of David ; a rich and 
heavenly treasure is this. A repository, or 
an altar of sacred fire. The people of God, 
in all succeeding ages, have had recourse 
to it, both as an example and a Spring of 
most lively and exalted devotions. Choose 
a Psalm suited to your own case and frame 
and temper ; compare your hearts with the 
Psalmist, and yourcircumstances with his ; 
lift up your souls to God in the words of 
David, or imitate his language, where his 
words do not so perfectly express your 
case. Enter into his spirit, form and iiao- 
del your pious affections by that illustrious 
pattern ; and be sure to bring Christ and the 
sweet discoveries of grace, and the bless- 
ings of the gospel into this sort of devotion. 
David himself under the influence of the 
holy Spirit, practised this ; though in a 



208 DISCOURSE VII. 

more obscure manner, and in the style of 
prophecy : and if in the midst of such a 
dark dispensation, surrounded with types 
aud shadows, we find surprising efforts of 
fear and love, of joy and wonder, of desire 
and hope, of faith and adoration and praise, 
how unspeakably glorious and entertaining 
would it be to us, if w^e had a book of such 
holy melody, such harmonious worship, 
written by divine influence in the language 
of Christ and his gospel, interlined with the 
blood of the Son of God, adorned and en- 
livened with the grace and glory of a rising 
and. reigning Saviour, and animated and 
enriched with the holy Spirit, and the bless- 
ings of the New Testament ? Perhaps this 
is too sublime a privilege, too high a favour 
for the church to expect or enjoy in this 
corrupted and degenerate state: perhaps 
we must wait for such a seraphic volume, 
till we are raised to join the songs and the 
harps of the heavenly Jerusalem ; or at 
least till the happy time of the restitution 
of all things, when a new heaven and a new 
earth shall introduce such a state of things 
among men, as shall be near akin to the 
glory of the upper world. 

But it is time now to go on t9 the next 
particular. 

VI.''" When you find a devout passion 
arising in your heart, indulge and cherish it, 



DISCOURSE VII. 209 

if there be a convenient season." Take 
heed that you do not banish the holy 
thought, or suppress the sacred affection. 
Do not immediately plunge yourself, with- 
out necessity, into the businesses of life, or 
any vain amusements, lest you damp the 
wing of your holy desires, which would 
bear you upward to God ; quench not those 
seeds of divine and heavenly fire which 
God has kindled in your souls. When the 
quickening Spirit takes hold of your heart, 
take care that you do not refuse to follow 
him ; resist not the motions of the blessed 
Spirit, lest he retire grieved, and it may be 
long ere he return. 1 Thess. v. 19. Eph. 
iv. 30. When the blessed God does .as it 
were take you by the hand, a'nd lead you 
•iside from the world, to converse with him-, 
self; when your blessed Saviour doth, if I 
may so express it, touch the springs of de- 
votion within you, and as it were invife and 
beckon you to holy fellowship with him, 
have a care that you do not turn rudely 
away from him, and renounce his invita- 
tions. 

Let such sacred seasons, such heavenly 
moments, be duly valued and improved. 
Let pious affections be indulged and* pro- 
moted, unless plain and necessary business 
call you away, at that time, to other engage- 
ments. 

9# 



210 DISCOURSE VII. 

But if it should happen, that the provi- 
dence of God and your duty demand your 
thoughts and your hands to be employed in 
secular affairs, when you feel a devout pas- 
sion arising, you may in some measure re- 
medy this inconvenience, by the follov^ing 
advice. 

VII. " Endeavour to keep up a constant 
favour of religion, in the midst of the busi- 
nesses and cares of this life." While you 
are travelling through the v/ilderness of this 
world, walk always Avith God : do every 
thing in the name of God, as under the in- 
fluence of his command, and with a design 
for his glory : and let your soul go forth of- 
ten towards him in short and holy exer- 
cises : this will keep the devout affections 
awake and active. 

If you have found God in the closet, or 
in the church, carry him with you into the 
things of the world, into the shop and the 
family, so far as a proper attention to your 
daily business will permit. Suffer no longer 
intermissions of your heavenly work, lest 
your pious affections grow cold. Let your 
thotlghts in short intervals of worship go 
out towards God. Never let an hour pass, 
if possible, without some devout aspirations 
towards heaven. In the evening watches, 
at midnight, and at the dawn of the morn- 
ing, the holy Psalmist sent up liis thoughts 



DISCOURSE VII. 



211 



to God: and he was often breathing out his 
soul towards him amidst the affairs of the 
day, Psalm Ixiii. 6. " I will meditate on 
thee in the night-watches." Psalm xxv. 5. 
" Thou art the God of my salvation, on thee 
do I wait all the day." O blessed souls, 
who imitate the practice of that sublime 
saint, the man after God's own heart I 

VIII. " Confine not your religion aK ■ 
ways to your thoughts." Sometimes, per- 
haps, while you are musing, the fire will 
burn, as DaA^id found it. Psalm xxxix. 3. 
Then speak with your tongue to God, or to 
man, as David did, who was most exqui^ 
sitely skilled in all the holy methods of a 
devout life, and was the noblest pattern of 
sacred fervour. ,^: 

Gain some acquaintance with lively chris- 
tians : mutual conversation shall raise the 
divine flame higher, like united torches, 
which increase each other's blaze. Sharps 
en your d-esires, and kindle your hopes and 
joys, by mutual and holy discourse. Bor- 
row a coal from the altar of the sanctuarjr, 
from the ordinances of public worshipyand 
warm your own hearts, by endfeayouring to 
warm the heart of your neighbour. Speak 
to one another of the heavenly world, till 
each of you find your wings stretched for 
the flight, and you long for the divine sum- 
mons. Mix your flames of celestial love, 



212 DISCOURSE VII. 

as angels do, and let them spire upward, 
and point toward Jesus your beloved. Man 
is a social creature, and his passions were 
made to be raised by converse. Break 
therefore through the reproach and shame 
of a degenerate age, and aspire to the life 
and discourse, and joy of angels. 

IX. '• Seek earnestly the influences of 
the quickening Spirit." Without him you 
can do nothing. It is the Spirit of God, 
who raised dead sinners at first into a di- 
vine life, and he puts all the languid springs 
of' life into new motion. Those vigorous 
and active powers of the soul, w^hich have 
so strong an influence to promote the viva- 
city and beauty of true religion, are under 
his government, and they want a divine 
touch from his finger, to quicken and acce- 
lerate their motions. It is he who awakens 
our fear, who excites our hopes, who kin- 
dles our love and desire to things holy and 
heavenly: and it is he who exalts our spiri- 
tual joys. How often does the pious Psalm- 
ist cry out for quickening grace in the 
119th Psalm, and for the continued in- 
fluences of the holy Spirit, in other parts of 
his devotional writings ? The whole Church 
prays for the same quickening operations, 
Psalm Ixxx. 11. " Quicken us, O Lord, so 
will we call upon thee." Let this be tho 



DISCOURSE VII. 213 

matter of our daily and importunate* re- 

j; quests to heaven. 

[ And let us remember too, that, under 
the gospel, Christ is the spring of our life ; 
he is appointed by the Father to bestow his 
Spirit : he himself is called our life, Coloss. 
iii. 3. He himself is a quickening Spirit, 
1 Cor. XV. 45. All the principles of, our 

^holiness must be derived from him, as our 
head of vital- influence. 

X. The last thing I shall propose, in or- 
der to keep the devout passions awake and 
lively in religion, is to live much in the face 
of unseen things, and to die daily. Set 
yourselves continually as on the borders of 
the grave, and the invisible world : this was 
St. Paul's practice-, 1 Cor. xv. 31. I protest 
by^ our rejoicing which I have in Christ 
Jesus our Lord, I die daily : and his daily 
living in the views of death, had a happy in- 
fluence to maintain his rejoicing in Christ. 
If you constantly look on yourselves as 
dying creatures,- and place yourselves on 
the borders of eternity, you will thei» take 
leave daily of sensible things, and live by 

* Most of the Greek copies, as well as our own 
translation, read it "your rejoicing;" but it is hard to 
make sense of it, without changing the word "your,'* 
into " our" which in the Greek is but the small change 
of one letter : and one or more manuscript copies have 
' the word ^' our,'' and support this alteration. 



214 DISCOURSE VII. 

the faith of things invisible. You will then 
behold God as ever near you, God, the 
judge of ail, the everlasting hope, and the 
portion of his saints : you v^ill be very un« 
willing to have your heart absent from God, 
while you look at death as just at hand. I 

Then the blessed Jesus, both as a Saviour 
and a Judge, will be much in your thoughts. 
" Am I ready to appear before my judge ? 
Have I any strong and secure evidences 
that Jesus is my Saviour ?" 

Then the gates of heaven will be everts | 
it were open before you, and the glories of 
it always within your view; you will think 
much of the heavenly world, with all its holy 
inhabitants, with its divine enjoyments, with 
its everlasting freedom from temptation and | 
sin and sorrow, with its delightful business^ I 
and its unknown pleasures. 

Then this world will be as a dead thing 
in your eyes ; it will have very little power 
to work on your passions, and to draw you 
aside from God : he will be your love, and 
your *11. Tlfe strength of faith, and the 
views of death, will command your fears, 
and hopes, and desires, and confine them to 
the things of religion. 

Then you will be ever Solicitous to 
brighten your evidences for heaven, to keep 
your hopes firm and unshaken, by oftenk' 
reviewing the grounds and foundations of 



DISCOURSE VII. 215 

them : and your spirit will be solicitous to 
be found ready at all hours for the call and 
summons into the upper world. Every 
power of nature, and every passion will be 
kept in its right frame and posture under 
the influence of such an expectation. You 
will hate every sin, and abhor the thoughts 
of it, lest your souls be defiled afresh, when 
they are just called to depart : you will keep 
your desires of God always warm, and set 
a guard on your love, lest it suffer any de^ 
cay : you will raise your thoughts to a con- 
tinual delightful converse with heavenly 
things, and enter into the spirit of joy and 
praise. O blessed souls, who daily prac- 
tise this sort of departure from the body, 
and anticipate the pleasures of the heaven- 
ly state ! Who love the blessed God, and 
delight in him here on earth, as far as mor- 
tality will admit, and are breathing after 
the more consummate holiness and joy of 
paradise I This was the frame and temper, 
j this the devout language of Armelle Nico- 
I las, a poor servant maid, who had spent 
j more than thirty years of her life in the 
' constant exercises of divine love. " God 
has not sent me, says she, into this world, 
but to love himself, and through his great 
mercy, I have loved him so much, that I 
cannot love him more, after the manner of 



216 DISCOURSE VII. 

mortals : I must go to him, that I may 
love him after the manner of the blessed." 

MEDITATION. 

I HAVE learned so much of religion, as 
to know that it does not consist in vehe- 
ment commotions of animal nature, in sub- 
lime raptures and exstacies : we may be sin- 
cere christians in the exercise of repent- 
ance and faith, and in the practice of holy 
obedience, without any overwhelming sor- 
rows, or transporting joys. Yet since the 
various affections of fear and hope, love 
and sorrow, desire and delight, belong to 
my nature, I am sure j;hey ought to be all 
engaged in some measure in the service of 
God and religion : and I have been ^taught 
in this discourse, by what methods it may 
be obtained. Let me now recollect these 
advices briefly in order to practice. 

And, first, I will endeavour that the rul^ 
ing powers of my soul, the understanding 
and the will," be employed in these affairs 
of everlasting importance. O may my me- 
mory be richly furnished witli the trea- 
sures of divine knowledge ! may I be fully 
convinced of the necessity and worth of 
true religion ! may I have the most exalted 
esteem of God and things heavenly ! may 
these be the objects of my dearest choice ! 



DISCOURSE VII. 217 

May my will be firmly determined to fix on 
these as my highest portion, and my ever- 
lasting all ! 

And can I go thus far, without making 
God the supreme object of my love ? Can 
I choose him with all his excellencies, his 
graces, and his glories, as my all-sufficient 
happiness, and live upon him as such, and 
yet not love him ? I think this is impossi- 
ble. Let me then cherish and improve this 
divine principle of love ; and divine love 
-will govern all the other passions of nature, 
will employ them in their proper work, and 
distribute to them their several offices in 
the religious life. Love is the sovereign 
and commanding passion. 

But what shall I do, O Lord, to love 
thee niore ? How shall I kindle this divine 
flame ? How shall I nourish it and raise it 
high ? I meditate on the wonders of thy 
Mature, the extent of thy goodness, and the 
riches of thy mercy, and yet how little do 
I love thee? I review the sweet variety of 
Blessings that I have received from thy hand 
in this life, and the surprizing transactions 
of thy condescending grace, which relate 
to the life to come, and yet how little do 
I love thee? L behold Jesus thy Son sent 
out of thy own bosom to take flesh and 
blood, and to dwell among sinners, even 
Jesus, the Son of thy highest love, sent 

10 



218 BISCOURSE VIL 



1 



down to earth to be made a sacrifice, and 
to die for the sake of such guilty wretches 
as I am, an amazing instance of thy love 
to us, " and yet how little do I love thee ?" 
I read in thy word, what thou hast done 
for me in ancient times and ages, long be- 
fore I was born ; and what thou wilt do for 
me in worlds and ages beyond death -and 
time, and yet I am ashamed to think how 
little I love thee. My thoughts run from 
one eternity to another, and trace the va- 
rious and transcendent wonders of thy love 
in the several periods of time : glorious 
and astonishing instances of the compas- 
sion of a God to a worthless creature, to 
a worm; to dust, an atom of being, yea 
worse, _to a sinner, a rebel that deserves 
thy imm.ortal hatred, and "yet how little 
do I love thee ?" I wander in meditation 
through the various fields of nature and 
grace, and methinks I see my God in all 
of them, diffusing the unbounded riches 
of his wisdom and love through tbem all : 
I endeavour to take my warmest passions 
with me, w^hile I rove among the unknown 
scenes of thy power and goodness ; and 
yet, O my God, after all, I am forced to 
confess, " how exceeding little it is that I 
lore thee !" Lord, it is thy own work to 
turn a heart of stone into flesh, to make it 
feel all 'the tender impressions of divine 



c 

DISCOURSE VII. 219 

love, and to kindle the celestial principle 
of life and love within me. Come down 
from on high, thou Sovereign of all na- 
ture ; come down into my heart, take pos- 
session of it for thyself, and let it ever burn 
and breathe towards thee, and send up the 
perpetual incense of holy desire and love. 
I will set a watch upon my eyes and my 
ears, and all the avenues of sense and ap- 
petite, that the creatures may not enter in 
too far, and dwell too near my heart, which 
I have given up to God. I would place a 
sacred guard upon it, to keep off every 
rival. I know the danger that arises from 
the flattering objects of flesh and sense: If 
they but once gain admittance into the 
heart, they are ever busy to take * too fast 
hold there. Many of tha weeds of this 
wilderness have gay and flattering blos- 
soms, and if once they are permitted to 
creep into the soul, they twine about every 
passion, and root themselves there, , to the 
certain prejudice of divine love : alas, for 
that holy plant ! That flower of heavenly 
original ! How the noxious weeds of this 
world choke its growth, and cause it to de- 
cay and languish ! 

O may all the tempting trifles and vain 
delights of this life stand aloof from my 
heart, for I have devoted it to God for a 
habitation. Keep your distance, ye dan- 



220 DISCOURSE VII. 

gerous creatures, from the g-ates of this 
temple where my God dwells. There let 
liim dwell alone, and reign over all my 
"powers for ever. 

/I would seek after my God in his public 
ordinances, I would seek after him daily 
in my secret retirements : I would give my 
pious passions a greater loose where no eye 
T)eholds me, where no ear can take notice 
of me. O may these retiring hours be the 
special Reason for the lively exercise and 
the increase of my devout affections ! There 
I can tell my God all my heart in private 
groans and private rejoicings. He shall 
know what my sighs mean, what are my 
fears and my painful sorrows : there I can 
blush before him for my secret sins, and 
open the floods of holy mourning : there I 
can pour out into his eai* my bitter com- 
plaints of the rising corruptions of my 
heart ; I can lament over the vanity of my 
thoughts, and spread my unknown tempta- 
tions before his eyes. I can lay myself low 
at his feet in the dust, and tell him with 
humble confusion of face and soul, how 
much Ihave received from him, how much 
I have done against him, and how little I 
have loved him. 

*In the secret chambers of retiremeiU 'I 
may join the exercises of an active faith 
and a cheerful' hope, • with the sighs and 



DISCOURSE VII. 221 

tears of penitence : there I can breathe out. 
my most vehement desires after the pre- 
sence of my God, and after the sweeter 
sensations of his love. " My flesh and my 
heart may pant and cry out after God, the 
living God, and say, when shall I come 
and appear before him?" Psalm xlii. 1,2, 
When shall I be made more entirely like 
him ? When shall these days of sin and. 
temptation, these tedious seasons of ab- 
sence and distance from God, come to a 
final period, never, never to return again. 

The lonely and retired devotions of el 
christian, may lead him near the walls of 
paradise, and the seats of the blessed, al-- 
most within the sound of their songs and 
praises. In a solitary cell, in a field remote 
from cities and men, or in a grove such as 
Abraham planted, we may " call upon the 
name of the Lord, the everlasting God," 
.Gen xxi. 33. There we may send up our 
souls toward heaven in most pathetic breath- 
ings of love and joy : the heart and the. 
tongue may rejoice together in God oui; 
Saviour, while none but the trees and the 
skies bear witness to the hidden pleasures 
Qf our religion, and the sweet sensationsi 
of a conscience at peace with God: the 
trees in all their lovely bloom and verdure, 
and the skies in a cloudless and serene sea- 
son, are happy emblems of such ft con- 



222 DISCOURSE vn. 

science, serene, and blooming with life and 
glory. 

When the snn and day-light are with- 
<Jrawn, we may talk over our hopes, and 
our holy joys, to the silence of the moon 
and the midnight stars : silent arc they, 
and secure witnesses of those divine de- 
lights, to which the noisy and the busy 
world are too much strangers, and which 
the public must not know. There we may 
make our boast aloud in the name of Jesus, 
as our Saviour, and our beloved : we may 
reckon up before him, who sees all things, 
our fairest evidences of an interest in his 
love, and may glory in the hope of his sal- 
vation ; surely when all the pleasing pas- 
sions of nature are excited into such a just 
and lively exercise on divine objects, the 
power and the pleasure of religion within 
us will acquire thereby a lasting strength. 

In order to carry on this happy work, I 
am directed to converse miich with those 
parts of Christianity, which are suited to 
raise the most sprightly affections. I have 
done it, O Lord, and yet I feel my heart 
too little warmed and raised ! but I would 
repeat the holy work ; it is all duty, and it 
should be all delight : I would repeat it, 
till I find the sacred fire kindle and glow 
within. I would run over again that vast 
and extensive field of wonders : again, let 



DISCOURSE VII. 



223 



me survey the sublime glories of thy ma- 
jesty, thy power, thy wisdom, thy good- 
ness, all unsearchable and all infinite. I 
would dwell upon them till I am lost iii this 
boundless (3cean of godhead, and swallow- 
ed up in adoration and wonder. Then 
would I recal my past days of life, and 
bring past years back to my remembrance. 
With a sacred solemnity would I revolve 
in my heart the multitude of my transgres- 
sions, and the multitude of divine mercies, 
till my soul be melted into repentance and 
love : there is an unknown pleasure in \he 
tears of pious lo^e and holy mourning. I 
would read the astonishing history of the 
love of Christ, and trace the divine path 
of it down from the Father's bosom to his 
state of infancy, to the manager, and stable 
at Bethlehem : I would follow this golden 
track of love through the weaknesses, the 
fatigues, and sorrows .of a life of poverty 
and reproach : I would trace it on the nwid- 
night mountains of prayer, and through 
the solitary wilderness, the ^tage «of his 
sore temptations : I follow the shining 
thread of his unwearied love, till it brought 
him to sustain unknown agonies in the gar- 
den, and nailed him to the cursed tree: I 
behold him there groan ng and expiring 
under the weight of my sins : amazing 
spectacle ! What will awaken devout pas- 



224 DISCOURSE VII. 

sion, if such varied scenes of divine love 
and divine sorrow cannot do it ? 

Let me borrow those blessed patterns of 
warm and living devotion which David has 
left us, and tune the songs of Zion to the 
name of Jesus : the sweetest songs and the 
sweetest name will happily unite and in- 
crease the divine harmony. O when shall 
I feel the ardent desires, the penitent sor- 
rows, the holy wishes, and pious elevated 
joys of the ancient Psalmist; O for the 
return of the same Spirit, that gave the 
soul and the harp of David these sacred 
and immortal elevations. 

When I find a divine influence reaching 
my heart, and raising a devout passion 
there, I would hold fast and cherish the 
heavenly sunbeam, till I feel the holy 
warmth diffused through all my powers : 
nor would I willingly suffer the tides of bu- 
siness or care in this world to quench the 
spark which was kindled from above. 

I would keep up the favour of divine 
things among the common affairs of this 
life. A present God in the midst of the 
labours of this world will sweeten and sanc- 
tify them all, and bring heaven down to 
earth. 

Suffer me not, my God, to bury all 
my ^religion within me. Let my tongue 
communicate some of the wonders' of thy 



DISCOURSE VII. 225 

mercy, and be a lively instrument of thy 
praise : Give courage and wisdom, that I 
may know when and how to divert vain 
discourse, and may dare to speak for God. 
O when shall the time be that " they which 
fear the Lord, shall speak often one to 
another," Mai. iii. 16. and warm each 
others hearts with heavenly conversation ? 
When shall the blessed Spirit revisit the 
forsaken churches, and dwell again in the 
degenerate families of christians ? While 
we feel our hearts heavy, and our affections 
cold and languid in the things of God, we 
toil and heave in vain without his Spirit. 
We flutter upon the ground, and make at- 
tempts to rise heaven-ward ; but alas, we 
grovel and groan under our impotence, till 
the Spirit gives us an eagle's wing, to mount 
us up toward the heavenly world. With 
all our pious endeavours, let us join our 
efforts of importunate request for the re- 
turn of the quickening Spirit, and his vital 
influences. 

O that I might live much in the faith of 
unseen things, and set myself continually 
as on the borders of death. Turn aside, 
the veil, blessed Jesus, that I may look 
into the unseen world ! Or give the eyes of 
my faith vigour enough to pierce through 
the veil, and see my God and my Saviour. 
And may this blessed sight make a divine 



226 DISCOURSE VII. 

impression upon all the powers of my na- 
ture, such as may awaken every vigorous 
and pleasing passion of the heart, such as 
may engage me to keep my hopes always 
awake, my evidences for heaven unspotted, 
and my desires ever breathing toward thy 
presence, my Saviour and my God ! If my 
pious passions were in their warmest exer- 
cise, I should be ever ready to obey the 
divine order for my removal hence: I 
should receive the messenger death with a 
smile on my countenance, and follow the 
angel with a cheerful step, while he leads 
me away from a world of sin, sorrow, and ; 
darkness, to the regions of life and joy. ' 
O happy country, where sorrow and sin 
have no place, where my spirit in its in- 
most powers shall feel an eternal spring ! 
While we dwell in this world, it is all win- 
ter with us ; we behold the sun as afar off, 
andi-eceive but feeble influences. But in 
the world on high, all things around us are 
full of life and love : there are no gloomy 
hours, no chilling blasts, no cold and clou- 
dy seasons. There no damp shall hang 
upon the wing of my devout affections, no 
water shall ever quench the fervour of them. 
There I shall be for ever ascending nearer 
to God, the centre of my soul, and all my 
motions will be swifter too. Every power 



DISCOURSE VII. 227 

within me shall feel stronger influences of 
his love, when I am got so far within the 
divine attraction. Then I shall complain 
no longer of absence and distance, nor feel 
any more eclipse of the face of my God ; 
but I shall be perpetually receiving a full 
efflux of light and love from the eternal sun 
of grace and glory. I shall spend the ages 
of my endless existence in a rich variety of 
sublime duties and sublime delights ; such 
delights and such duties as are, and must 
be unknown, till we put ofl' these coarse 
and cumberous garments of flesh and blood, 
these veils that enwrap our sauls in dark- 
ness. 

Happy shall I be indeed, when all the 
troublesome and disquieting influences of 
flesh and blood shall cease : all m^painful 
and uneasy passions shall be for ever ba- 
nished : Grief, and fear, and anger, shall 
vex my spirit no more. Animal nature 
must be buried in the dust, and all the fer- 
ments and emotions of it shall cease for 
ever. 

But must I then loose all these kindly 
ferments of nature too, all those pleasing 
emotions, which in this present state, add 
fresh vigour and delight to the soul, in the 
exercise of its best affections, love and joy ? 
If all these must be lost, who can inform 



228 DISCOURSE VII. 

me what shall come in the room of them ? 
Surely love and joy are immortal things ; 
they were made for heaven, and cannot 
die, nor shall their vigour be diminished 
in a world that was built for happiness. 
What strange unknown powers then shall 
be given to separate spirits, whereby these 
divine affections shall be invigorated, and 
raised to nobler degrees of exercise ? Or 
shall my separate spirit when it is divested 
of every clog, and exulting in complete 
liberty, use all its own affectionate powers 
in a nobler and more perfect manner, when 
I shall see the divine objects of them face 
to face ? Surely the holy souls that are dis- 
missed from flesh, shall be richly furnished 
with all necessary faculties for their own 
jfelicity.* Every saint in glory shall find full 
satisfaction, and intense delight, when all 
its best affections are united and employed 
on the most lovely and desirable objects ; 
when they are all fixed on Gcd the supreme 
good, and on Jesus the mosi perfect, and 
most divine image of th'e Father. 

Jesus, together with the Father, shall 
be the object of our contemplation and love. 
And at the same time his holy soul, with 
all its pure affections, rejoicing in its own 
nearness to God, shall be the pattern of 
dtir heavenly joy. "I in them, (says our 



Tdiscourse VII. 229 

blessed Lord) and thou in me, that they 
all may be made perfect in one." John 
xvii. 23. And we are told. — " We shall 
be like him for we shall see him as he is," 
1 John iii. 2. 

These are the sweet notices of oiir future 
felicity, that he has given us to cheer our 
hearts in the present state of faith and 
labour: these are the bright but distant 
glimpses of those entertainments which are 
prepared for us in our Father's house. 
These are little prospects of those rivers of 
pleasure that run between the hills of para- 
dise, and make glad the new Jerusalem, 
the city of our God : such joys a^ th^ese 
await us on high. Do we not feel our 
hearts pant, and point upward ? These are 
the joys of divine love ? the very faith and- 
hope of this blessedness, the slight glimpse 
and foretastes of it here on earth, have 
something in them unspeakable and full of 
glory : but the complete relish and fruition 
of it is reserved for heaven, and for hea- 
venly inhabitants to know and enjoy. There, 
and there only, are such immediate and 
rich profusions of divine love, as the heart 
of man in this mortal state is neither pure 
enough to partake of, nor large enough to 
conceive. We must die, we must die out 
of this world, to learn perfectly what those 



230 DISCOURSE VIL 

pleasures are ; nor can we know them but 
by enjoyment. Missionary angels could 
not make us understand them, nor a visit 
from departed saints. Earthly languages 
were not made to express the fulness of 
these celestial sensations : the ideas of pa- 
radise demand unutterable words ; nor are 
spirits dwelling in flesh either fit or able to 
hear them. We must die then, to learn 
how these blessed ones love God, and how 
God loves the blessed. O when will the 
happy day arrive ? Yvllen will the hour 
shine out upon us, and the bright moment 
appear ? It is coming, it is coming, as fast as 
time can roll away, and the sun and moon 
can finish their appointed periods. 

Come, my soul, rouse thyself from thy 
dull and lethargic temper ; shake off the 
dust of this earth, that hangs heavy upon 
thy better powers. Hast thou not been ' 
long weary of such cold and frozen devo- 
tion, as is practised in this earthly state ? 
Hast thou not long complained of loving 
thy God so little, and of tasting so little of 
his love? Come, raise thyself above these' 
dull and despicable scenes of flesh and 
sense, above all that is not immortal. Lift 
up thy head with cheerfulness and eager 
hope: look out with longing eyes beyond 
the shadowy region of death, and salute 



DISCOURSE VII. 231 

the dawning of thy eternal day : stretch out 
thy arms of intense desire, and send a flight 
of devout wishes across the .dark valley, to 
meet the aproaching joys of immortality. 



^ THE END. 



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